Scenes

from the

Secret History

of the

World

by

F. Paul Wilson

Scenes from the Secret History of the World

© 2014 by F. Paul Wilson

All rights reserved.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

First published June 2014

AUTHOR’S NOTE

The Secret History of the World

The preponderance of my work deals with a history of the world that remains undiscovered, unexplored, and unknown to most of humanity. Some of this secret history has been revealed in the Adversary Cycle, some in the Repairman Jack novels, and bits and pieces in other, seemingly unconnected works. Taken together, even these millions of words barely scratch the surface of what has been going on behind the scenes, hidden from the workaday world.

A chronological listing follows. (NB: “Year Zero” is the end of civilization as we know it; “Year Zero Minus One” is the year preceding it, etc.)

CONTENTS

THE PAST

“Demonsong” (prehistory)

“The Compendium of Srem” (1498)

“Aryans and Absinthe” (1923-1924)

Black Wind (1926-1945)

The Keep (1941)

Reborn (February-March 1968)

“Dat-Tay-Vao” (March 1968)

Jack: Secret Histories (1983)

Jack: Secret Circles (1983)

Jack: Secret Vengeance (1983)

“Faces” (1988)

Cold City (1990)

Dark City (1991)

Fear City (1993)

YEAR ZERO MINUS THREE

These tales occur three years before Nightworld

Sibs (February)

The Tomb (summer)

“The Barrens” (ends in September)

“A Day in the Life” (October)

“The Long Way Home” (November)

Legacies (December)

Year Zero Minus Two

These tales occur two years before Nightworld

“Interlude at Duane’s” (April)

Conspiracies (April)

All the Rage (May)

Hosts (June)

The Haunted Air (August)

Gateways (September)

Crisscross (November)

Infernal (December)

Year Zero Minus One

These tales occur during the year before Nightworld

Harbingers (January)

“Infernal Night” (with Heather Graham)

Bloodline (April)

By the Sword (May)

Ground Zero (July)

The Touch (ends in August)

The Peabody-Ozymandias Traveling Circus & Oddity Emporium

(ends in September)

“Tenants”

Year Zero

“Pelts”

Reprisal (ends in February)

Fatal Error (February)

The Dark at the End (March)

Nightworld (May)

Timeline

Summary

Complete Bibliography

Prehistory

Demonsong

We start with a story from waaaay in the past, set about 15,000 years ago in what I’ve come to call the First Age, when the Ally and the Otherness were more open about their contest for Earth.

“Demonsong” was written early in my career – 1978, to be exact – and sold to Gerald W. Page for Heroic Fantasy (DAW #334). I had become a fan of Robert E. Howard at age fourteen when I found Conan the Conqueror in the back half of an old Ace Double. “Demonsong” was how I thought sword and sorcery should sound – people saying “nay,” calling each other “outlander” or “interloper” and such, and lots of passive voice.

I had no idea that a couple of years later I would haul these two characters into the twentieth century. When I was working out the names and backgrounds of the immortal archenemies in The Keep, I flashed back to “Demonsong” and latched onto them. This then is the first appearance of Glaeken and Rasalom.

l may cringe now at the style, but I find “Demonsong” interesting because I realize it’s where I began my practice of turning genres on their heads. I remember consciously setting out to write a sword-and-sorcery tale wherein no one slashes anyone or even draws a sword. And I succeeded.

(BTW – the Choir of Chaos was inspired by the Finlay illo above)

You can grab the story for free here: “Demonsong”

1498

The Compendium of Srem

The Compendium plays a huge role in the Secret History. It contains all the lost lore from the First Age in a seemingly endless number of pages. But in the final run-up to Nightworld its content-ordering technology crashed and the pages began appearing in chaotic order. Only someone with a brain like Weezy Connell’s could even begin to make sense of it.

How the story came to be: Somewhere during 2010 or so I bumped into Otto Penzler at either the Edgar banquet or Thrillerfest. He said he was starting a line called Bibliomysteries which would be short mysteries centered around books. He would publish them as stand-alone volumes.

I made the mistake of mentioning that I wanted to write a story about a “forbidden” book that falls into the hands of the Spanish Inquisition and completely flummoxes them. I say “mistake” because I had all sorts of other commitments and wasn’t ready to write it yet. Well, Otto proved to be relentless. Every time – and I do mean every time – we ran into each other that was the first thing out of his mouth: “Where’s that story about the Inquisition book?”

It took me until late 2013 to get it done. We were both delighted with the story.

Those of you who are into the Repairman Jack series will recognize the Compendium – it’s been a source of knowledge about the First Age since it first appeared in Crisscross.

Here’s the opening section:

The Compendium of Srem

(sample)

1

Tomás de Torquemada opened his eyes in the dark.

Was that…?

Yes. Someone knocking on his door.

“Who is it?”

“Brother Adelard, good Prior. I must speak to you.”

Even if he had not said his name, Tomás would have recognized the French accent. He glanced up at his open window. Stars filled the sky with no hint of dawn.

“It is late. Can it not wait until morning?”

“I fear not.”

“Come then.”

With great effort, Tomás struggled to bring his eighty-year-old body to a sitting position as Brother Adelard entered the tiny room. He carried a candle and a cloth-wrapped bundle. He set both next to the Vulgate Bible on the rickety desk in the corner.

“May I be seated, Prior?”

Tomás gestured to the room’s single straight-back chair. Adelard dropped into it, then bounded up again.

“No. I cannot sit.”

“What prompts you to disturb my slumber?”

Adelard was half his age and full of righteous energy – one of the inquisitors the pope had assigned to Tomás four years ago. He seemed unable to contain that energy now. The candlelight reflected in his bright blue eyes as he paced Tomás’s room.

“I know you are not feeling well, Prior, but I thought it best to bring this to you in the dark hours.”

“Bring what?”

He fairly leaped to the table where he pulled the cloth from the rectangular bundle, revealing a book. Even from across the room, even with his failing eyesight, Tomás knew this was like no book he had ever seen.

“This,” he said, lifting the candle and bringing both closer. He held the book before Tomás, displaying the cover. “Have you ever seen anything like it?”

Tomás shook his head. No, he hadn’t.

The covers and spine seemed to be made of stamped metal. He squinted at the strange marks embossed on the cover. They made no sense at first, then seemed to swim into focus. Words…in Spanish… at least one was in Spanish.

Compendio ran across the upper half in large, ornate letters; and below that, half size: Srem.

“What do you see?” Adelard said. The candle flame wavered as his hand began to shake.

“The title, I should think.”

“The words, Prior. Please tell me the words you see.”

“My eyes are bad but I am not blind: Compendio and Srem.”

The candle flame wavered more violently.

“When I look at it, Prior, I too see Srem, but to my eyes the first word is not Compendio but Compendium.”

Tomás bent closer. No, his eyes had not fooled him.

“It is as plain as day: Compendio. It ends in i-o.”

“You were raised speaking Spanish, were you not, Prior?”

“As a boy of Valladolid, I should say so.”

“As you know, I was raised in Lyon and spent most of my life speaking French before the pope assigned me to assist you.”

To rein me in, you mean, Tomás thought, but said nothing.

The current Pope, Alexander VI, thought him too …what word had he had used? Fervent. Yes, that was it. How could one be too fervent in safeguarding the Faith? And hadn’t he previously narrowed procedures, limiting torture only to those accused by at least two citizens of good standing? Before that, any wild accusation could send someone to the rack.

“Yes-yes. What of it?”

“When…” He swallowed. “When you look at the cover, you see Compendio, a Spanish word. When I look at the cover I see a French word: Compendium.”

Tomás pushed the book away and struggled to his feet.

“Have you gone mad?”

Adelard staggered back, trembling. “I feared I was, I was sure I was, but you see it too.”

“I see what is stamped in the metal, nothing more!”

“But this afternoon, when Amaury was sweeping my room, he spied the cover and asked where I had learned to read Berber. I asked him what he meant. He grinned and pointed to the cover, saying ‘Berber! Berber!’”

Tomás felt himself going cold.

“Berber?”

“Yes. He was born in Almeria where they speak Berber, and to his eyes the two words on the cover were written in Berber script. He can read only a little of the writing, but he saw enough of it growing up. I opened the book for him and he kept nodding and grinning, saying ‘Berber’ over and over.”

Tomás knew Amaury, as did everyone else in the monastery – a simpleminded Morisco who performed menial tasks for the monks, like sweeping and serving at table. He was incapable of duplicity.

“After that, I gave Brother Ramiro a quick look at the cover, and he saw Compendio, just as you do.” Adelard looked as if he were in physical pain. “It appears to me, good Prior, that whoever looks at this book sees the words in their native tongue. But how can that be? How can that be?”

Tomás’s knees felt weak. He pulled the chair to his side and lowered himself onto it.

“What sort of deviltry have you brought into our house?”

“I had no idea it was any sort of deviltry when I bought it. I spied it in the marketplace. A Moor had laid it out on a blanket with other trinkets and carvings. I thought it so unusual I bought it for Brother Ramiro – you know how he loves books. I thought he could add it to our library. Not till Amaury made his comment did I realize that it was more than simply a book with an odd cover. It…” He shook his head. “I don’t know what it is, Prior, but it has certainly been touched by deviltry. That is why I’ve brought it to you.”

To me, Tomás thought. Well, it would have to be me, wouldn’t it.

Yet in all his fifteen years as Grand Inquisitor he had never had to deal with sorcery or witchcraft. Truth be told, he could give no credence to that sort of nonsense. Peon superstitions.

Until now.

“That is not all, Prior. Look at the pattern around the words. What do you see?”

Tomás leaned closer. “I see crosshatching.”

“So do I. Now, close your eyes for a count of three.”

He did so, then reopened them. The pattern had changed to semicircles, each row facing the opposite way of the row above and below it.

His heart gave a painful squeeze in his chest.

“What do you see?”

“A…a wavy pattern.”

“I kept my eyes open and I still see the cross hatching.”

Tomás said nothing as he tried to comprehend what was happening here. Finally…

“There is surely deviltry on the covers. What lies between?”

Adelard’s expression was bleak. “Heresy, Prior…the most profound heresy I have ever seen or heard.”

“That is an extreme judgment, Brother Adelard. It also means you have read it.”

“Not all. Not nearly all. I spent the rest of the afternoon and all night reading it until just before I came to your door. And even so, I have only begun. It is evil, Prior. Unspeakably evil.”

He did not recall Adelard being prone to exaggeration, but this last had to be an overstatement.

“Show me.”

Adelard placed the tome on the table and opened it. Tomás noticed that the metal cover was attached to the spine by odd interlacing hinges of a kind he had never seen before. The pages looked equally odd. Moving his chair closer, he reached out and ran his fingers over the paper – if it was paper at all – and it felt thinner than the skin of an onion, yet completely opaque. He would have expected such delicate material to be marred by wrinkles and tears, but each page was perfect.

As was the writing that graced those pages – perfect Spanish. It had the appearance of an ornate handwritten script, yet each letter was perfect, and identical to every other of its kind. Every “a” looked like every other “a,” every “m” like every other “m.” Tomás had seen one of the Holy Bibles printed by that German, Gutenberg, where each letter had been exactly like all its brothers. The Gutenberg book had been printed in two columns per page, however, whereas the script in this compendium flowed from margin to margin.

“Show me heresy,” Tomás said.

“Let me show you deviltry first, Prior,” said the monk as he began to turn the pages at blinding speed.

“You go too fast. How will you know when to stop?”

“I will know, Prior. I will know.”

Tomás saw numerous illustrations fly by, many in color.

“Here!” Adelard said, stopping and jabbing his finger at a page. “Here is deviltry most infernal!”

Tomás felt his saliva dry as he faced a page with an illustration that moved…a globe spinning in a rectangular black void. Lines crisscrossed the globe, connecting glowing dots on its surface.

“Heavenly Lord! It…” He licked his lips. “It moves.”

He reached out, but hesitated. It looked as if his hand might pass into the void depicted on the page.

“Go ahead, Prior. I have touched it.”

He ran his fingers over the spinning globe. It felt as flat and smooth as the rest of the page – no motion against his fingertips, and yet the globe continued to turn beneath them.

“What sorcery is this?”

“I was praying you could tell me. Do you think that sphere is supposed to represent the world?”

“I do not know. Perhaps. The Queen has just sent that Genoan, Colón, on his third voyage to the New World. He has proven that the world is round…a sphere.”

Adelard shrugged. “He has proven only what sailors have been saying for decades.”

Ah, yes. Brother Abelard fancied himself a philosopher.

Tomás stared at the spinning globe. Although some members of the Church hierarchy argued against it, most now accepted that the world God had created for Mankind was indeed round; but if this apparition was supposed to be that world, then the perspective was from that of the Lord Himself.

Why now? Why, with his health slipping away like sand – he doubted he would survive the year – did a tome that could only be described as sorcerous find its way to his quarters? In his younger days he would have relished hunting down the perpetrators of this deviltry. But now… now he barely had the strength to drag himself through the day.

He sighed. “Light my candle and leave this abomination to me. I would read it.”

“I know you must, dear Prior, but prepare yourself. The heresies are so profound they will…they will steal your sleep.”

“I doubt that Brother Adelard.” In his years as Grand Inquisitor he had heard every conceivable heresy. “I doubt that very much.”

But no matter what its contents, this tome had already stolen his sleep.

After Adelard departed, he looked around at his spare quarters. Four familiar whitewashed walls, bare except for the crucifix over his bed. A white ceiling and a sepia tiled floor. A cot, a desk, a chair, a small chest of drawers, and a Holy Bible comprised the furnishings. As prior, as Grand Inquisitor, as the queen’s confessor, no one would have raised an eyebrow had he requisitioned more comfortable quarters. But earthly trappings led to distractions, and he would not be swayed from his Holy Course.

Before opening the Compendium, he took his bible, kissed its cover, and laid in in his lap…

The full chapbook is available here: The Compendium of Srem

1923-1924

Aryans and Absinthe

…introduces us to Ernst Drexler. His connection to the super-secret Septimus Order is never mentioned in the story, but he’s obviously got an agenda. He plays a pivotal role in the shape of the twentieth century, and his foppish son, Ernst II will be a major player in the last few decades of the Secret History.

As for the story itself: Early in the summer of 1993 Douglas E. Winter called to invite me into his latest anthology. Revelations would consist of a novella for every decade of the twentieth century, each story centering on some apocalyptic event. He told me to pick a decade. I chose the 1920s – Weimar Germany, specifically. The arts were flourishing but the economic chaos and runaway inflation of the times were so surreal, so devastating to everyone’s day-to-day life that people – Jew and gentile alike – were looking for a savior. A foppish little guy named Hitler came to prominence presenting himself as that savior.

I did extensive research for “Aryans and Absinthe.” Charles Bracelen Flood’s remarkable Hitler: The Path to Power (Houghton Mifflin, 1989) was a major source. I wanted to get the details right so I could make you feel you were there. I was pretty high on it when I finished. I thought I’d captured tenor and tempo of the times, felt I’d conveyed an apocalyptic experience.

The opening segment follows:

Aryans and Absinthe

(sample)

Today it takes 40,000 marks to buy a single US dollar.

Volkischer Beobachter, May 4, 1923

Ernst Drexler found the strangest things entertaining. That was how he always phrased it: entertaining. Even inflation could be entertaining, he said.

Karl Stehr remembered seeing Ernst around the Berlin art venues for months before he actually met him. He stood out in that perennially scruffy crowd with his neatly pressed suit and vest, starched collar and tie, soft hat either on his head or under his arm, and his distinctive silver headed cane wrapped in black rhinoceros hide. His black hair swept back sleek as linoleum from his high forehead; the bright blue eyes that framed his aquiline nose were never still, always darting about under his dark eyebrows; thin lips, a strong chin, and tanned skin, even in winter, completed the picture. Karl guessed Ernst to be in his mid thirties, but his mien was that of someone older.

For weeks at a time he would seem to be everywhere, and never at a loss for something to say. At the Paul Klee show where Klee's latest, "The Twittering Machine," had been on exhibition, Karl had overheard his sarcastic comment that Klee had joined the Bauhaus not a moment too soon. Ernst was always at the right places: at the opening of "Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler," at the cast party for that Czech play "R.U.R.," and at the secret screenings of Murnau's "Nosferatu," to name just a few.

And then he'd be nowhere. He'd disappear for weeks or a month without a word to anyone. When he returned he would pick up just where he'd left off, as if there'd been no hiatus. And when he was in town he all but lived at the Romanisches Cafe where nightly he would wander among the tables, glass in hand, a meandering focus of raillery and bavardage, dropping dry, witty, acerbic comments on art and literature like ripe fruit. No one seemed to remember who first introduced him to the cafe. He more or less insinuated himself into the regulars on his own. After a while it seemed he had always been there. Everyone knew Ernst but no one knew him well. His persona was a strange mixture of accessibility and aloofness that Karl found intriguing.

They began their friendship on a cool Saturday evening in the spring. Karl had closed his bookshop early and wandered down Budapesterstrasse to the Romanisches. It occupied the corner at Tauentzien across from the Gedachtniskirche: large for a cafe, with a roomy sidewalk area and a spacious interior for use on inclement days and during the colder seasons.

Karl had situated himself under the awning, his knickered legs resting on the empty chair next to him; he sipped an aperitif among the blossoming flower boxes as he reread Siddartha. At the sound of clacking high heels he'd glance up and watch the "new look" women as they trooped past in pairs and trios with their clinging dresses fluttering about their knees and their smooth tight caps pulled down over their bobbed hair, their red lips, mascara'd eyes, and coats trimmed in fluffy fur snuggled around their necks.

Karl loved Berlin. He'd been infatuated with the city since his first sight of it when his father had brought him here before the war; two years ago, on his twentieth birthday, he'd dropped out of the University to carry on an extended affair with her. His lover was the center of the art world, of the new freedoms. You could be what you wanted here: a free thinker, a free lover, a communist, even a fascist; men could dress like women and women could dress like men. No limits. All the new movements in music, the arts, the cinema, and the theater had their roots here. Every time he turned around he found a new marvel.

Night was upon Karl's mistress when Ernst Drexler stopped by the table and introduced himself.

"We've not formally met," he said, thrusting out his hand. "Your name is Stehr, I believe. Come join me at my table. There are a number of things I wish to discuss with you."

Karl wondered what things this man more than ten years his senior could wish to discuss, but since he had no other plans for the evening, he went along.

The usual crowd was in attendance at the Romanisches that night. Lately it had become the purlieu of Berlin bohemia – all the artists, writers, journalists, critics, composers, editors, directors, scripters, and anyone else who had anything to do with the avant garde of German arts, plus the girlfriends, the boyfriends, the mere hangers on. Some sat rooted in place, others roved ceaselessly from table to table. Smoke undulated in a muslin layer above a gallimaufry of scraggly beards, stringy manes, bobbed hair framing black rimmed eyes, homburgs, berets, monocles, pince nez, foot long cigarette holders, baggy sweaters, dark stockings, period attire ranging from the Hellenic to the pre Raphaelite.

"I saw you at Siegfried the other night," Ernst said as they reached his table in a dim rear corner, out of the peristaltic flow. Ernst took the seat against the wall where he could watch the room; he left the other for Karl. "What do you think of Lang's latest?"

"Very Germanic," Karl said as he took his seat and reluctantly turned his back to the room. He was a people watcher.

Ernst laughed. "How diplomatic! But how true. Deceit, betrayal, and backstabbing – in both the figurative and literal sense. Germanic indeed. Hardly Neue Sachlichkeit, though."

"I think New Realism was the furthest thing from Lang's mind. Now, Die Strasse, on the other hand–”

"Neue Sachlichkeit will soon join Expressionism in the mausoleum of movements. And good riddance. It is shit."

"Kunst ist Scheisse?" Karl said, smiling. "Dada is the deadest of them all."

Ernst laughed again. "My, you are sharp, Karl. That's why I wanted to talk to you. You're very bright. You're one of the few people in this room who will be able to appreciate my new entertainment."

"Really? And what is that?"

"Inflation."

Before Karl could ask what he meant, Ernst flagged down a passing waiter.

"The usual for me, Freddy, and–?" He pointed to Karl, who ordered a schnapps.

"Inflation? Never heard of it. A new card game?"

Ernst smiled. "No, no. It's played with money."

"Of course. But how–”

"It's played with real money in the real world. It's quite entertaining. I've been playing it since the New Year."

Freddy soon delivered Karl's schnapps. For Ernst he brought an empty stemmed glass, a sweaty carafe of chilled water, and a small bowl of sugar cubes. Karl watched fascinated as Ernst pulled a silver flask from his breast pocket and unscrewed the top. He poured three fingers of clear green liquid into the glass, then returned the flask to his coat. Next he produced a slotted spoon, placed a sugar cube in its bowl, and held it over the glass. Then he dribbled water from the carafe, letting it flow over the cube and into the glass to mix with the green liquid... which began to turn a pale yellow.

"Absinthe!" Karl whispered.

"Quite. I developed a taste for it before the War. Too bad it's illegal now – although it's still easily come by."

Now Karl knew why Ernst frequently reserved this out of the way table. Instinctively he glanced around, but no one was watching.

Ernst sipped and smacked his lips. "Ever tried any?"

"No."

Karl had never had the opportunity. And besides, he'd heard that it drove you mad.

Ernst slid his glass across the table. "Take a sip."

Part of Karl urged him to say no, while another pushed his hand forward and wound his fingers around the stem of the glass. He lifted it to his lips and took a tiny sip.

The bitterness rocked his head back and puckered his cheeks.

"That's the wormwood," Ernst said, retrieving his glass. "Takes some getting used to."

Karl shuddered as he swallowed. "How did that ever become a craze?"

"For half a century, all across the continent, the cocktail hour was known as l'heure verte after this little concoction." He sipped again, closed his eyes, savoring. "At the proper time, in the proper place, it can be... revelatory."

After a moment, he opened his eyes and motioned Karl closer.

"Here. Move over this way and sit by me. I wish to show you something."

Karl slid his chair around to where they both sat facing the crowded main room of the Romanisches.

Ernst waved his arm. "Look at them, Karl. The cream of the city's artists attended by their cachinating claques and coteries of epigones and acolytes, mixing with the city's lowlifes and lunatics. Morphine addicts and vegetarians cheek by jowl with Bolsheviks and boulevardiers, arrivistes and anarchists, abortionists and anti vivisectionists, directors and dilettantes, doyennes and demimondaines."

Karl wondered how much time Ernst spent here sipping his absinthe and observing the scene. And why. He sounded like an entomologist studying a particularly interesting anthill.

"Everyone wants to join the parade. They operate under the self induced delusion that they're in control: 'What happens in the Berlin arts today, the rest of the world copies next week.' True enough, perhaps. But this is the Masque of the Red Death, Karl. Huge forces are at play around them, and they are certain to get crushed as the game unfolds. Germany is falling apart – the impossible war reparations are suffocating us, the French and Belgians have been camped in the Ruhr Valley since January, the communists are trying to take over the north, the right wingers and monarchists practically own Bavaria, and the Reichsbank's answer to the economic problems is to print more money."

"Is that bad?"

"Of course. It's only paper. It's been sending prices through the roof."

He withdrew his wallet from his breast pocket, pulled a bill from it, and passed it to Karl.

Karl recognized it. "An American dollar."

Ernst nodded. "'Good as gold,' as they say. I bought it for 10,000 marks in January. Care to guess what the local bank was paying for it today?"

"I don't know. Perhaps...”

"Forty thousand. Forty thousand marks."

Karl was impressed. "You quadrupled your money in four months."

"No, Karl," Ernst said with a wry smile. "I've merely quadrupled the number of marks I control. My buying power is exactly what it was in January. But I'm one of the very few people in this storm tossed land who can say so."

"Maybe I should try that," Karl said softly, admiring the elegant simplicity of the plan. "Take my savings and convert it to American dollars."

"By all means do. Clean out your bank account, pull every mark you own out from under your mattress and put them into dollars. But that's mere survival – hardly entertainment."

"Survival sounds good enough."

"No, my friend. Survival is never enough. Animals limit their concerns to mere survival; humans seek entertainment. That is why we must find a way to make inflation entertaining. Inflation is here. There's nothing we can do about it. So let's have some fun with it."

"I don't know...”

"Do you own a house?"

"Yes," Karl said slowly, cautiously. He didn't know where this was leading. "And no."

"Really. You mean it's mortgaged to the hilt?"

"No. Actually it's my mother's. A small estate north of the city near Bernau. But I manage it for her."

Father had died a colonel in the Argonne and he'd left it to her. But Mother had no head for money, and she hadn't been quite herself in the five years since Father's death. So Karl took care of the lands and the accounts, but spent most of his time in Berlin. His bookstore barely broke even, but he hadn't opened it for profit. He'd made it a place where local writers and artists were welcome to stop and browse and meet; he reserved a small area in the rear of the store where they could sit and talk and sip the coffee he kept hot for them. His dream was that someday one of the poor unknowns who partook of his hospitality would become famous and perhaps remember the place kindly – and perhaps someday stop by to say hello with Thomas Mann or the reclusive Herman Hesse in tow. Until then Karl would be quite satisfied with providing coffee and rolls to starving scribblers.

But even from the beginning, the shop had paid non pecuniary dividends. It was his entree to the literati, and from there to the entire artistic caravan that swirled through Berlin.

"Any danger of losing it?"

"No." The estate produced enough so that, along with Father's Army pension, his mother could live comfortably.

"Good. Then mortgage it. Borrow to the hilt on it, and then borrow some more. Then turn all those marks into US dollars."

Karl was struck dumb by the idea. The family home had never had a lien on it. Never. The idea was unthinkable.

"No. I – I couldn't."

Ernst put his arm around Karl's shoulder and leaned closer. Karl could smell the absinthe on his breath.

"Do it, Karl. Trust me in this. It's an entertainment, but you'll see some practical benefits as well. Mark my words, six months from now you'll be able to pay off your entire mortgage with a single US dollar. A single coin."

"I don't know...”

"You must. I need someone who'll play the game with me. It's much more entertaining when you have someone to share the fun with."

Ernst straightened up and lifted his glass.

"A toast!" He clinked his glass against Karl's. "By the way, do you know where glass clinking originated? Back in the old days, when poisoning a rival was a fad among the upper classes, it became the practice to allow your companion to pour some of his drink into your cup, and vice versa. That way, if one of the drinks were poisoned, you'd both suffer."

"How charming."

"Quite. Inevitably the pouring would be accompanied by the clink of one container against another. Hence, the modern custom." Once again he clinked his absinthe against Karl's schnapps. "Trust me, Karl. Inflation can be very entertaining – and profitable as well. I expect the mark to lose fully half its value in the next six weeks. So don't delay."

He raised his glass. "To inflation!" he cried and drained the absinthe.

Karl sipped his schnapps in silence.

Ernst rose from his seat. "I expect to see you dollar rich and mark poor when I return."

"Where are you going?"

"A little trip I take every so often. I like to swing up through Saxony and Thuringia to see what the local Bolsheviks are up to – I have a membership in the German Communist Party, you know. I subscribe to Rote Fahne, listen to speeches by the Zentrale, and go to rallies. It's very entertaining. But after I tire of that – Marxist rhetoric can be so boring – I head south to Munich to see what the other end of the political spectrum is doing. I'm also a member of the National Socialist German Workers Party down there and subscribe to their Volkischer Beobachter."

"Never heard of them. How can they call themselves 'National' if they're not nationally known?"

"Just as they can call themselves Socialists when they are stridently fascist. Although frankly I, for one, have difficulty discerning much difference between either end of the spectrum – they are distinguishable only by their paraphernalia and their rhetoric. The National Socialists – the call themselves Nazis – are a power in Munich and other parts of Bavaria, but no one pays too much attention to them up here. I must take you down there sometime to listen to one of their leaders. Herr Hitler is quite a personality. I'm sure our friend Freud would love to get him on the couch."

"Hitler? Never heard of him, either."

"You really should hear him speak sometime. Very entertaining."

“Aryans and Absinthe” can be found in Aftershock & Others

1926-1945

Black Wind

Nagata’s sword connects Black Wind to the Secret History. It’s a special sword, the mysterious Gaijin Masamune (its secrets will be revealed in By the Sword); it plays a small part in BW but will come to play a huge part in the run-up to Nightworld.

Black Wind has been called my "lost" novel. It's an orphan – a World War II revisionist historical family saga horror romance. (Try saying that three times quickly.)

After finishing The Touch in 1985, the next story in line went back to WWII, but instead of Europe, where I’d set The Keep, this time I’d travel into the Pacific Theater. I’d been reading a few books that recounted how nicely the Pearl Harbor attack played into Roosevelt’s desire to go to war against the Axis, hinting that Pearl had been set up for attack. In Black Wind I play with that theory, warping Twentieth Century history to my own dramatic ends – not changing events to an alternate history, but controlling their subtexts over a twenty-year period through four point-of-view characters, three of them Japanese.

The mix of cultural fanaticism and wrenchingly dark supernatural horror wrapped around a love story (a love quadrangle fuels the heart of the beast) proved a real challenge for me.

I wasn't trying to do anything special with it. It was simply the next novel I was ready to write. After years of daunting research, 800 manuscript pages, it turned out to be my poorest seller. Not a single bad review, but no one seemed to know where to place it. Consequently, it got lost.

But over the years it has stayed in print and slowly found a disparate audience. Romance readers dig it as a love story. History buffs get into the conspiracies and shifting subtexts. And horror fans enjoy the scary parts.

I think it's my best novel – not necessarily my favorite, but my best. I'm perhaps inordinately proud of the fact that it was reprinted in Japan... a confirmation of the accuracy of all my research.

Here are the opening scenes… day one of a two-decade saga…

Black Wind

(sample)

1926

THE YEAR OF THE TIGER

JULY

SAN FRANCISCO

A slithering sound awoke him.

Matsuo shot up to a crouch on the futon and strained to see through the room's inky blackness.

Not again! Please, not again!

Out of the darkness the voices began their whispering.

"Are you the one? The one who bears the seeds? Are you the one to die?"

And then he saw them, limned by the faint light from the hallway, wizened, near-naked forms with bare, glistening scalps, their faces dark blanks except for an occasional shining pair of eyes. All carried knives that gleamed in the darkness.

All except one. A tall, gaunt, hooded figure stood in the bedroom doorway. Its face too was entirely in shadow except for a pair of glowing eyes, burning softly as the creatures inched toward him along the floor.

Some crawled, some crept, some dragged themselves along, and one writhed along the floor with a knife blade clamped between his teeth in an obscene parody of a snake. They slithered closer, their voices rising.

"Yes! He's the one who bears the seeds! He dies! He dies now! Kill him!"

One reared up and thrust his dagger unerringly toward Matsuo's throat–

–and he woke up gasping, trembling, drenched with sweat.

The dream again. For a few months it had stopped, but now it was back.

Only a dream, he kept telling himself, but he could not escape the terror or stop his trembling. He did not want to be alone but he could not tell Nagata. He had described the dream to him once and had been told never to mention it again. It had been the first and only time he had ever seen the old samurai afraid.

Only one thing ever helped. Matsuo crept out of his room to the small Shinto shrine where Nagata kept his daisho – his pair of samurai swords. Daisho meant "Big-Little," a perfect name for the blades.

He placed his hand on the bigger sword, the katana, and felt his trembling cease and the terror fade. Now he felt safe. He did not know what it was about these swords, but they never failed to give him comfort. He lifted the katana – heavy, almost ten pounds – and carried it back to his room where he placed it on the futon and lay next it.

Sleep was slow in returning, but with his hand resting on the pearl inlay of the black enameled scabbard, he knew if he was patient it would come. And when it did, it would be peaceful.

* * *

My folks called me Frankie. The kids called me Spot.

On the morning of July 10, my sixteenth birthday, I stood in front of the bathroom mirror and stared at the source of my nickname. I'd done this countless times. I didn't see my ears, nose, mouth – none of which were remarkable. Nor did I see my blue eyes or sandy brown hair.

Only that awful purple mark.

It's known in my family as the Slater Stain. All Slater males carry it on their faces to varying degrees. The medical books call it a capillary hemangioma, which tells you nothing. Granma Slater always called it a "port wine stain," which pretty much captures the look of it. Imagine spilling a glass of burgundy onto a white linen tablecloth and letting it sit there overnight. That's a good picture of the Slater Stain.

My father and my uncles had little ones, barely visible at their hairlines. I had all the luck. Mine was as wide as my hand and it ran from my left upper eyelid, through my hairline, to the top of my scalp.

No words can convey the loathing I felt for that mark. I tried combing my hair over it, but my hair would never quite reach. I even went so far once as to borrow my mother's makeup powder to cover it, but the result was hideous. I would have peeled that purple skin right off my face if I hadn't known that the resulting scar would have left me even more disfigured.

I’d cried many times over that mark. And over the nickname it earned me. It kept me from being a regular chum, one of the boys, the only thing keeping me out of Mick McGarrigle's gang. He'd like me if not for that. And so would the girls.

And so I stood there, dreaming someone would come along and offer me a birthday wish. Anything I wanted: gold, jewels, power, fame. My heart's desire. I wouldn't have a moment's hesitation. I knew exactly what I'd wish for.

"Frankie!"

I recognized the voice: Matsuo, calling from outside. Matsuo never called me Spot.

I stuck my head out the bathroom window. I was on the second floor. Matsuo was standing on the grass over to the left below my bedroom window.

"Hello, below!"

"Want to come over?" he said, his amber Japanese face tilting up.

He was smiling, but his eyes looked a little hollow, like he hadn't been sleeping too well. He was dressed like me, in a short-sleeve shirt and knee-length pants.

I had few friends. In fact, to be honest, I had only one. And most likely I would not have been friends with Matsuo if he hadn't lived here on the grounds of my family home. I was that shy.

"I can't today. My father's taking me sailing." The new Lightning had arrived last week and Dad was going to start teaching me how to sail.

"Come out till he gets back."

"Back?" I had a sinking feeling. "Where'd he go?"

Matsuo shrugged. "I just saw him driving out."

I ran downstairs. Mom was in the dining room where everything was mahogany and crystal, talking to Oba-san. Mom's hair was twisted up in countless tight little curlers. Her face looked tight and pinched without her hair around it. She was sitting at the long table under the chandelier, smoking a cigarette in a little ivory holder and going over a list with Oba-san.

"Happy birthday, Master Frankie!" Oba-san said in her thickly accented English. She smiled and bowed.

I bowed back. "Arigato."

"Yes, darling," Mom said, wrapping an arm around my waist and giving me a quick hug. "Happy sixteenth."

"Arigato," I said again.

"Speak English, dear."

"I like speaking Japanese."

"You do Oba-san no service by speaking Japanese to her. She's in America now and wants to learn to speak English. Isn't that right, Oba-san?"

Oba-san said, "Yes, ma'am," to Mom but winked at me.

Oba-san was an ever-cheerful woman. The normally slimming effect of a kimono was lost on her portly frame. She was our cook as well as Matsuo's aunt. Her real name was Kimura, but Matsuo had called her Oba-san – oba being the Japanese word for "aunt" – as long as anyone could remember and that was now her name around our house.

"Where's Dad?"

"He had to meet with Commander Foster."

I felt a lump swelling in my throat. "But we were supposed to go sailing."

"Oh, darling, he didn't forget. It's just that there were some last minute problems with this new contract and he had to iron them out. I hate it when they bother him with business matters on the weekend but he had to go."

I hated it, too. Dad was always getting called away.

"Maybe this afternoon," I said.

"I'm afraid it will be too late then, dear. You know we've got all these people coming for cocktails and dinner at five. There won't be time. But he'll make it up to you. You know that."

Trouble was, I didn't know any such thing.

"And as soon as he comes back, we'll have your birthday cake. Okay?"

"Okay." I didn't have much choice.

"Swell. Now you just go out and play for a while. I've got to plan tonight's menu with Oba-san."

I waved and ran outside, determined to hide my disappointment. I had been waiting all week for today: my birthday, sailing with my dad, just the two of us on the water with no phones and no telegrams.

I walked to the ocean edge of the yard and looked down to where the brand-new Lightning sat on rollers on the thin strip of beach fifty feet below. A sob was hiding somewhere within me. I didn't look for it. I had learned from Matsuo and Nagata that the face within is not the face for the world.

Matsuo came running up. "You're not going sailing at all?" he said when he stopped beside me.

He had a lean face and body, dark brown eyes, and short black hair. He was my age and almost as tall. Only in the past year had I begun to stretch past him in height, and only by half an inch at that. But while I clomped along, Matsuo moved like a cat. His mind was as agile as his body and he spoke English as well as any American. And why not? He may have been born in Japan, but he grew up here. He had been speaking English almost as long as I had.

I guess I still needed practice keeping my two faces separate. I shook my head, not yet ready to trust myself to speak.

"I think you made a good decision," Matsuo said, shading his eyes as he looked out over the Pacific. "It looks choppy. Too much wind to learn sailing. Wise to wait until tomorrow when it will be calmer."

I looked north past the deep brown stone of the Presidio to where the morning sun lit the fog flowing through the Golden Gate, then out to the misty Pacific, calm and gently rolling toward shore under an easterly breeze that couldn't have topped five knots.

I glanced at Matsuo and had to smile. This was the truest friend a fellow could ever have.

If you wish to read on: Black Wind

1941

THE KEEP

The book that will not die!

What is it about the Keep? First published in 1981, it’s never been out of print and, day in and day out, year after year, it remains the bestselling title on my backlist. Over its lifespan it has appeared as a trade hardcover, a signed limited collector’s edition, a mass market paperback, a trade paperback, and even a graphic novel.

Maybe it’s because The Keep is the linchpin of the Secret History. If the German Army hadn’t occupied the place and vandalized its inner structure, we would still be ignorant of the Secret History. But with the freeing of the One, the dominoes began to fall, making Nightworld inevitable.

Though I spent the 70s writing SF for John Campbell’s Analog and Doubleday’s science fiction line, I really wanted to write horror. By 1980 the K-man’s success had convinced publishers that horror would sell, even if your name wasn’t Blatty or Levin, so I decided to go for it. King had continued Richard Matheson’s trend of moving horror away from brooding castles and into the towns and schools and homes of working- and middleclass Americans. I wasn’t ready for that. I’d read too much classic horror to give up on the Gothic just yet.

I’d spent decades immersed in everything horror – the works of Machen, LeFanu, James, and Lovecraft – tons of Lovecraft. I’d also been reading Chelsea Quinn Yarbro, and while I enjoyed her Hotel Transylvania, I found the idea of a heroic vampire ridiculous. They’re parasites. But she did start me thinking about vampires. Like how much more interesting if the vampire only pretended to be an ally. (Hmmm…there’s a thought.)

At that time I lived near Lakewood, NJ, with its large Orthodox Jewish community. I’d see them in the stores all the time and, since vampires were on my mind, I started wondering: If these rabbi types ran into a true vampire, how would they react to its traditional fear of the crucifix? Wouldn’t that raise an awful lot of questions about their belief system?

Interesting situation. Even more interesting if the being was pretending to be a vampire to hide its true nature – something much worse.

The juices started flowing. What if it wasn’t the Christian cross it feared, but something that resembled one? But what?

The solution came to me at 3 a.m. one morning. I scribbled it down in the dark and the story cascaded together.

Besides horror, I was reading a lot of Robert Ludlum in those days. I loved the international scope of his breathlessly paced novels, so full of conspiracies, lies, and deception, where no one was who they seemed to be.

So for my first horror novel I ignored all the small-town, narrow-focus Carrie/Salem’s Lot/The Shining clones everyone else was writing, and set up a big canvas. I took one part vampire myth, one part HPL’s cosmic evil, sprinkled in some Nazi einsatzkommandos for human evil, added smidgen of Ludlum paranoia and misdirection, a Jewish scholar, and began to paint.

My agent had a movie deal before he’d even begun to send it to publishers. Unfortunately The Keep wound up in the clutches of Michael Mann who warped it into a film memorable for striking imagery, bad dialogue, and head-scratching incomprehensibility.

But the book is still here, just as I wrote it. Here are the opening scenes.

THE KEEP

(sample)

Prologue

WARSAW, POLAND

Monday, 28 April 1941

0815 hours

A year and a half ago another name had graced the door, a Polish name, and no doubt a title and the name of a department or bureau in the Polish government. But Poland no longer belonged to the Poles, and thick, heavy strokes of black paint had crudely obliterated the name. Erich Kaempffer paused outside the door and tried to remember the name. Not that he cared. Merely an exercise in memory. A mahogany plaque now covered the spot, but smears of black showed around its edges. It read:

SS-OBERFÜCHRER W. HOSSBACH

RSHA-DIVISION OF RACE AND RESETTLEMENT

Warsaw District

He paused to compose himself. What did Hossbach want of him? Why the early morning summons? He was angry with himself for letting this upset him, but no one in the SS, no matter how secure his position, even an officer rising as rapidly as he, could be summoned to report "immediately" to a superior's office without experiencing a spasm of apprehension.

Kaempffer took one last deep breath, masked his anxiety, and pushed through the door. The corporal who acted as General Hossbach's secretary snapped to attention. The man was new and Kaempffer could see that the soldier didn't recognize him. It was understandable – Kaempffer had been at Auschwitz for the past year.

"Sturmbannführer Kaempffer," was all he said, allowing the youngster to take it from there. The corporal pivoted and strode through to the inner office. He returned immediately.

"Oberführer Hossbach will see you now, Herr Major."

Kaempffer breezed past the corporal and stepped into Hossbach's office to find him sitting on the edge of his desk.

"Ah, Erich! Good morning!" Hossbach said with uncharacteristic joviality. "Coffee?"

"No thank you, Wilhelm." He had craved a cup until this very moment, but Hossbach's smile had immediately put him on guard. Now there was a knot where an empty stomach had been.

"Very well, then. But take off your coat and get comfortable.

The calendar said April, but it was still cold in Warsaw. Kaempffer wore his overlong SS greatcoat. He removed it and his officer's cap slowly and hung them on the wall rack with great care, forcing Hossbach to watch him and, perhaps, to dwell on their physical differences. Hossbach was portly, balding, in his early fifties. Kaempffer was a decade younger, with a tightly muscled frame and a full head of boyishly blond hair. And Erich Kaempffer was on his way up.

"Congratulations, by the way, on your promotion and on your new assignment. The Ploiesti position is quite a plum.”

"Yes." Kaempffer maintained a neutral tone. "I just hope I can live up to Berlin's confidence in me.”

“I’m sure you will."

Kaempffer knew that Hossbach's good wishes were as hollow as the promises of resettlement he made to the Polish Jews. Hossbach had wanted Ploiesti for himself – every SS officer wanted it. The opportunities for advancement and for personal profit in being commandant of the major camp in Romania were enormous. In the relentless pursuit of position within the huge bureaucracy created by Heinrich Himmler, where one eye was always fixed on the vulnerable back of the man ahead of you, and the other eye ever watchful over your shoulder at the man behind you, a sincere wish for success was a fantasy.

In the uncomfortable silence that followed, Kaempffer scanned the walls and repressed a sneer as he noted more lightly colored squares and rectangles where degrees and citations had been hung by the previous occupant. Hossbach had not redecorated. Typical of the man to try to give the impression that he was much too busy with SS matters to bother with trifles such as having the walls painted. So obviously an act. Kaempffer did not need to put on a show of his devotion to the SS. His every waking hour was devoted to furthering his position in the organization.

He pretended to study the large map of Poland on the wall, its face studded with colored pins representing concentrations of undesirables. This had been a busy year for Hossbach's RSHA office; it was through here that Poland's Jewish population was being directed toward the "resettlement center" near the rail nexus of Auschwitz. Kaempffer imagined his own office-to-be in Ploiesti, with a map of Romania on the wall, studded with his own pins. Ploiesti…there could be no doubt that Hossbach's cheery manner boded ill. Something had gone wrong somewhere and Hossbach was going to make full use of his last few days as superior officer to rub Kaempffer's nose in it.

"Is there some way I might be of service to you?” Kaempffer finally asked.

"Not to me, per se, but to the High Command. There is a little problem in Romania at the moment. An inconvenience, really."

“Oh?”

"Yes. A small regular army detachment stationed in the Alps north of Ploiesti has been suffering some losses – apparently due to local partisan activity – and the officer wishes to abandon his position."

"That's an army matter." Major Kaempffer didn't like this one bit. "It has nothing to do with the SS."

"But it does." Hossbach reached behind him and plucked a piece of paper off his desktop. "The High Command passed this on to Obergruppenfführer Heydrich's office. I think it is rather fitting that I pass it on to you."

"Why fitting?"

"The officer in question is Captain Klaus Woermann, the one you brought to my attention a year or so ago because of his refusal to join the Party."

Kaempffer allowed himself an instant of guarded relief. "And since I'll be in Romania, this is to be dumped in my lap.”

"Precisely. Your year's tutelage at Auschwitz should have taught you not only how to run an efficient camp, but how to deal with partisan locals as well. I'm sure you'll solve the matter quickly.”

“May I see the paper?"

"Certainly."

Kaempffer took the proffered slip and read the two lines. Then he read them again.

"Was this decoded properly?"

"Yes. I thought the wording rather odd myself, so I had it double-checked. It's accurate."

Kaempffer read the message again:

Request immediate relocation.

Something is murdering my men.

A disturbing message. He had known Woermann in the Great War and would always remember him as one of the stubbornest men alive. And now, in a new war, as an officer in the Reichswehr, Woermann had repeatedly refused to join the Party despite relentless pressure. Not a man to abandon a position, strategic or otherwise, once he had assumed it. Something must be very wrong for him to request relocation.

But what bothered Kaempffer even more was the choice of words. Woermann was intelligent and precise. He knew his message would pass through a number of hands along the transcription and decoding route and must have been trying to get something across to the High Command without going into detail.

But what? The word "murder" implied a purposeful human agent. Why then had he preceded it with "something"? A thing – an animal, a disease, a natural disaster – could kill, but it could not murder.

"I'm sure I don't have to tell you," Hossbach was saying, "that since Romania is an ally state rather than an occupied territory, a certain amount of finesse will be required.”

"I'm quite well aware of that."

A certain amount of finesse would be required in handling Woermann, too. Kaempffer had an old score to settle with him.

Hossbach tried to smile, but the attempt looked more like a leer. "All of us at RSHA, all the way up to General Heydrich, will be most interested to see how you fare in this…before you move on to the major task at Ploiesti.”

The emphasis on the word "before," and the slight pause preceding it, were not lost on Kaempffer. Hossbach was going to turn this little side trip to the Alps into a trial by fire. Kaempffer was due in Ploiesti in one week; if he could not handle Woermann's problem with sufficient dispatch, then it might be said that perhaps he was not the man to set up the resettlement camp at Ploiesti. There would be no shortage of candidates to take his place.

Spurred by a sudden sense of urgency, he rose and put on his coat and cap. "I foresee no problems. I'll leave at once with two squads of einsatzkommandos. If air transport can be arranged and proper rail connections made, we can be there by this evening."

"Excellent!" Hossbach said, returning Kaempffer's salute. "Two squads should be sufficient to take care of a few guerrillas." He turned and stepped to the door.

"More than sufficient, I'm sure."

SS-Sturmbannfohrer Kaempffer did not hear his superior's parting remark. Other words filled his mind: "Something is murdering my men…"

DINU PASS, ROMANIA

28 April 1941

1322 hours

Captain Klaus Woermann stepped to the south window of his room in the keep's tower and spat a stream of white into the open air.

Goat's milk – gah! For cheese, maybe, but not for drinking.

As he watched the liquid dissipate into a cloud of pale droplets plummeting the hundred feet or so to the rocks below, Woermann wished for a brimming stein of good German beer. The only thing he wanted more than the beer was to be gone from this antechamber to Hell.

But that was not to be. Not yet, anyway. He straightened his shoulders in a typically Prussian gesture. He was taller than average and had a large frame that had once supported more muscle but was now tending toward flab. His dark brown hair was cropped close; he had wide-set eyes, equally brown; a slightly crooked nose, broken in his youth; and a full mouth capable of a toothy grin when appropriate. His gray tunic was open to the waist, allowing his small paunch to protrude. He patted it. Too much sausage. When frustrated or dissatisfied, he tended to nibble between meals, usually at a sausage. The more frustrated and dissatisfied, the more he nibbled. He was getting fat.

Woermann's gaze came to rest on the tiny Romanian village across the gorge, basking in the afternoon sunlight, peaceful, a world away. Pulling himself from the window, he turned and walked across the room, a room lined with stone blocks, many of them inlaid with peculiar brass-and-nickel crosses. Forty-nine crosses in this room to be exact. He knew. He had counted them numerous times in the last three or four days. He walked past an easel holding a nearly finished painting, past a cluttered makeshift desk to the opposite window, the one that looked down on the keep's small courtyard.

Below, the off-duty men of his command stood in small groups, some talking in low tones, most sullen and silent, all avoiding the lengthening shadows. Another night was coming. Another of their number would die.

One man sat alone in a corner, whittling feverishly. Woermann squinted down at the piece of wood taking shape in the carver's hands – a crude cross. As if there weren't enough crosses around!

The men were afraid. And so was he. Quite a turnaround in less than a week. He remembered marching them through the gates of the keep as proud soldiers of the Wehrmacht, an army that had conquered Poland, Denmark, Norway, Holland, and Belgium; and then, after sweeping the remnants of the British Army into the sea at Dunkirk, had gone on to finish off France in thirty-nine days. And just this month Yugoslavia had been overrun in twelve days, Greece in a mere twenty-one as of yesterday. Nothing could stand against them. Born victors.

But that had been last week. Amazing what six horrible deaths could do to the conquerors of the world. It worried him. During the past week the world had constricted until nothing existed for him and his men beyond this undersized castle, this tomb of stone. They had run up against something that defied all their efforts to stop it, that killed and faded away, only to return to kill again. The heart was going out of them.

They…Woermann realized that he had not included himself among them for some time. The fight had gone out of his own heart back in Poland, near the town of Posnan… after the SS had moved in and he had seen firsthand the fate of those “undesirables” left in the wake of the victorious Wehrmacht. He had protested. As a result, he had seen no further combat. Just as well. He had lost all pride that day in thinking of himself as one of the conquerors of the world.

He left the window and returned to the desk. Oblivious to the framed photographs of his wife and his two sons, he stared down at the decoded message there.

SS-Sturmbannfahrer Kaempffer arriving today with

detachment einsatzkommandos. Maintain present position.

Why an SS major’? This was a regular army position. The SS had nothing to do with him, with the keep, or with Romania as far as he knew. But then there were so many things he failed to understand about this war. And Kaempffer, of all people! A rotten soldier, but no doubt an exemplary SS man. Why here? And why with einsatzkommandos? They were extermination squads. Death’s Head Troopers. Concentration camp muscle. Specialists in killing unarmed civilians. It was their work he had witnessed outside Posnan. Why were they coming here’?

Unarmed civilians…the words lingered…and as they did, a smile crept slowly into the corners of his mouth, leaving his eyes untouched.

Let the SS come. Woermann was now convinced there was an unarmed civilian of sorts at the root of all the deaths in the keep. But not the helpless cringing sort the SS was used to. Let them come. Let them taste the fear they so dearly loved to spread. Let them learn to believe in the unbelievable.

Woermann believed. A week ago he would have laughed at the thought. But now, the nearer the sun to the horizon, the more firmly he believed… and feared.

All within a week. There had been unanswered questions when they had first arrived at the keep, but no fear. A week. Was that all? It seemed ages ago that he had first laid eyes on the keep…

If you wish to read on… The Keep

1968

REBORN

Reborn is the direct sequel to The Keep. This is where the sleepy little Village of Monroe on Long Island’s north shore lands on the map of the Secret History. We’ll be returning to Monroe again and agaian as time goes on.

I had no idea I'd ever write another word related to The Keep. Same with The Touch and The Tomb. I considered them unrelated stand-alone novels. But my subconscious had other ideas.

In 1987, after finishing Black Wind, I started on Reborn. I'd outlined it with a different title years before but it didn't gel. I wanted it to look like a Rosemary's Baby or an Omen but actually be something different (just as The Keep looks like a vampire novel for a while, but it's not). But I wanted to use an evil entity other than the Antichrist. Then I realized I already had that entity in Rasalom. I needed a suburban setting convenient to Manhattan, and realized I already had one in Monroe where The Touch took place. Could I tie those novels into Rasalom's reincarnation and bring the books full circle?

If I brought Rasalom back, I was obligated to get rid of him, right? Things grew – and I do mean grew – from there. Somehow the mythology I’d invented for The Tomb became involved, and that brought Jack into the picture. The result was an outline for a 1,000 plus page novel. Nobody was going to publish that, so I broke it down into a trilogy – Reborn Reprisal, and Nightworld – and sold it that way. But in my head it remains a single novel – a roman fleuve, if you will.

Here’s how it starts…

REBORN

(sample)

Sunday

February 11, 1968

1

He was calling himself Mr. Veilleur these days – Gaston Veilleur – and tonight he found it difficult to sleep. A remote uneasiness made him restless, a vague malaise nettled his mind, stirring up old memories and ancient nightmares. But he refused to give up the chase. He measured his breathing and soon found the elusive prey within his grasp. But just as he was slipping off, something dragged him back to full wakefulness.

Light. From somewhere down the hall. He lifted his head to see. The glow came from the linen closet. Blue white radiance was streaming out along the edges of the closed door.

Moving carefully so as not to awaken his wife, Mr. Veilleur slipped out of bed and padded down the hall. His joints creaked in protest at the change in position. Old injuries, old wounds, reminders of each hung on, sounding little echoes from the past. He knew he was developing arthritis. No surprise there. His body looked sixty years old and had decided to begin acting accordingly.

He hesitated a moment with his hand on the knob of the closet door, then yanked it open. The very air within seemed to glow; it flowed and swirled and eddied, like burning liquid. But cold. He felt a chill as it splashed over him.

The source – what was causing this? The light seemed most intense in the rear corner of the bottom shelf, under the blankets. He reached down and pulled them away.

Mr. Veilleur bit back a cry of pain and threw an arm across his eyes as the naked brilliance lanced into his brain.

Then the glow began to fade.

When his eyes could see again, when he dared to look again, he found the source of the glow. Tucked back among the towels and sheets and blankets was what appeared to be a huge iron cross. He smiled. She'd saved it. After all these years, she still hung on to it.

The cross still pulsed with a cold blue radiance as he lifted it. He gripped the lower section of the upright with two hands and hefted it with an easy familiarity. Not a cross – a sword hilt. Once it had been gold and silver. After serving its purpose, it had changed. Now it was iron. Glowing iron.

Why? What did this mean?

Suddenly the glow faded away, leaving him staring at the dull gray surface of the metal. And then the metal itself began to change. He felt its surface grow coarse, saw tiny cracks appear, and then it began to crumble. Within seconds it was reduced to a coarse powder that sifted and ran through his fingers like grains of sand.

Something has happened. Something has gone wrong! But what?

Slightly unnerved, Mr. Veilleur stood empty handed in the dark and realized how quiet the world had become. All except for the sound of a jet passing high overhead.

2

Roderick Hanley twisted in his seat as he tried to stretch his cramped muscles and aching back. It had been a long flight from L.A., and even the extra width in first class cramped his big frame.

"We'll be landing shortly, Dr. Hanley," the stewardess said, leaning close to him. "Can I get you anything before we close the bar?"

Hanley winked at her. "You could, but it's not stocked in the bar."

Her laugh seemed genuine. "Seriously, though…"

"How about another gimlet?"

"Let's see." She touched a fingertip to her chin. "'Four  to one vodka to lime with a dash of Cointreau,' right?"

"Perfect."

She touched his shoulder. "Be right back."

Pushing seventy and I can still charm them.

He smoothed back his silvery hair and squared his shoulders inside the custom made British tweed shooting jacket. He often wondered if it was the aura of money he exuded or the burly, weathered good looks that belied his years. He was proud of both, never underestimating the power of the former and long since giving up any false modesty about the latter.

Being a Nobel Prize winner had never hurt either.

He accepted the drink from her and took a healthy gulp, hoping the ethanol would calm his jangled nerves. The flight had seemed interminable. But at last they were approaching Idlewilde. No, it was called Kennedy Airport now, wasn't it. He hadn't been able to get used to the name change. But no matter what the place was called, they'd be safely down on terra firma shortly.

And not a moment too soon.

Commercial flights were a pain. Like being trapped at a cocktail party in you own house. If you didn't like the company you couldn't just up and leave. He much preferred the comfort and convenience of his private Learjet where he could call all the shots. But yesterday morning he’d learned that the plane would be grounded for three days, possibly five, waiting for a part. Another five days in California among those Los Angeleans who were all starting to look like hippies or Hindus or both was more than he could tolerate. So he’d bitten the bullet and bought a ticket on this Boeing behemoth.

For once – just this once – he and Ed were traveling together.

He glanced at his traveling companion, dozing peacefully beside him. Edward Derr, M.D., two years younger but looking older, was used to this sort of travel. Hanley nudged him once, then again. Derr's eyes fluttered open.

"Wh what's wrong?" he said, straightening up in his seat.

"Landing soon. Want something before we touch down?"

Derr rubbed a hand over his craggy face. "No." He closed his eyes again. "Just wake me when it's over."

"How the hell can you sleep in these seats?"

"Practice."

Thirty years of regular attendance together at biological and genetic research conferences all over the world, and never once had they traveled on the same plane. Until today.

It would not do to have the pair of them die together.

Certain records and journals in the Monroe house were not yet ready for the light of day. He couldn't imagine any time in the near future when the world would be ready for them. Sometimes he wondered why he didn't simply burn them and have done with the whole affair. Sentimental reasons, he guessed. Or ego. Or both. Whatever the reason, he couldn't seem to bring himself to part with them.

A shame, really. He and Derr had made biological history and they couldn't tell anybody. That had been part of the pact they’d made that day in the first week of 1942. That and the promise that when one of them died, the other would immediately destroy the sensitive records.

After a more than a quarter century of living with that pact, he should have been accustomed to it. But no. He’d been in a state of constant anxiety since takeoff. But at last, the trip was over. All they had to do was land. They'd made it.

Suddenly came a violent jolt, a scream of agonized metal, and the 707 tilted to a crazy angle. Someone behind them in the tourist section screamed something about a wing tearing off, and then the plane plummeted, spinning wildly.

The thought of his own death was no more than a fleeting presence. The knowledge that there would be no one left to destroy the records crowded out everything else.

"The boy!" he cried, clutching Derr's arm. "They'll find out about the boy! He'll find out about himself!"

And then the plane came apart around him.

For the rest… Reborn

March 1968

Dat-Tay-Vao

The mysterious Dat-Tay-Vao was not always free to wander the globe as it does, hopping from person to person. Millennia ago it was trapped in an object, but was freed and has been following its own agenda ever since. But it knows it will eventually have to surrender its freedom in the final battle… and that the final battlefield will be America.

I'd originally intended to use a much shorter version of "Dat-tay-vao" as either a flashback or a prologue in The Touch, but no matter how I tried to work it in, it simply wouldn't fit. Used early on, it gave away too much of the mystery of what would be happening to Alan Bulmer in the body of the novel; inserted later, it seemed redundant. So I scrapped it.

After the novel was finished I returned to it and fleshed it out to make it a stand-alone story – a prequel to The Touch. It appeared in the March 1987 issue of Amazing Stories. The story takes place exactly nineteen years before its publication… right about the time of Reborn. The events in Reborn trigger the Dat-tay-vao's migration to the US where it plays an important part in the Secret History, as you will see in Nightworld.

Here’s how it starts…

Dat-Tay-Vao

1

Patsy cupped his hands gently over his belly to keep his intestines where they belonged. Weak, wet, and helpless, he lay on his back in the alley and looked up at the stars in the crystal sky, unable to move, afraid to call out. The one time he’d yelled loud enough to be heard all the way to the street, loops of bowel had squirmed against his hands, feeling like a pile of Mom’s slippery-slick homemade sausage all gray from boiling and coated with her tomato sauce. Visions of his insides surging from the slit in his abdomen like spring snakes from a novelty can of nuts had kept him from yelling again.

No one had come.

He knew he was dying. Good as dead, in fact. He could feel the blood oozing out of the vertical gash in his belly, seeping around his fingers and trailing down his forearms to the ground. Wet from neck to knees. Probably lying in a pool of blood… his very own homemade marinara sauce.

Help was maybe fifty feet away and he couldn’t call for it. Even if he could stand the sight of his guts jumping out of him, he no longer had the strength to yell. Yet help was out there… the nightsounds of Quang Ngai streetlife… so near…

Nothing ever goes right for me. Nothing. Ever.

It had been such a sweet deal. Six keys of Cambodian brown. He could’ve got that home to Flatbush no sweat and then he’d have been set up real good. Uncle Tony would’ve known what to do with the stuff and Patsy would’ve been made. And he’d never be called Fatman again. Only the grunts over here called him Fatman. He’d be Pasquale to the old boys, and Pat to the younger guys.

And Uncle Tony would’ve called him Kid, like he always did.

Yeah. Would have. If Uncle Tony could see him now, he’d call him Shit-for-Brains. He could hear him now:

Six keys for ten G’s? Whatsamatta witchoo? Din’t I always tell you if it seems too good to be true, it usually is? Ay! Gabidose! Din’t you smell no rat?

Nope. No rat smell. Because I didn’t want to smell a rat. Too eager for the deal. Too anxious for the quick score. Too damn stupid as usual to see how that sleazeball Hung was playing me like a hooked fish.

No Cambodian brown.

No deal.

Just a long, sharp K-bar.

The stars above went fuzzy and swam around, then came into focus again.

The pain had been awful at first, but that was gone now. Except for the cold, it was almost like getting smashed and crashed on scotch and grass and just drifting off. Almost pleasant. Except for the cold. And the fear.

Footsteps…coming from the left. He managed to turn his head a few degrees. A lone figure approached, silhouetted against the light from the street. A slow, unsteady, almost staggering walk. Whoever it was didn’t seem to be in any hurry. Hung? Come to finish him off?

But no. This guy was too skinny to be Hung.

The figure came up and squatted flatfooted on his haunches next to Patsy. In the dim glow of starlight and streetlight he saw a wrinkled face and a silvery goatee. The gook babbled something in Vietnamese.

God, it was Ho Chi Minh himself come to rob him.

Too late. The money’s gone. All gone.

No. Wasn’t Ho. Couldn’t be. Just an old papa-san in the usual black pajamas. They all looked the same, especially the old ones. The only thing different about this one was the big scar across his right eye. Looked as if the lids had been fused closed over the socket.

The old man reached down to where Patsy guarded his intestines and pushed his hands away. Patsy tried to scream in protest but heard only a sigh, tried to put his hands back up on his belly but they’d weakened to limp rubber and wouldn’t move.

The old man smiled as he singsonged in gooktalk and pressed his hands against the open wound in Patsy’s belly. Patsy screamed then, a hoarse, breathy sound torn from him by the searing pain that shot in all directions from where the old gook’s hands lay. The stars really swam around this time, fading as they moved, but they didn’t go out.

By the time his vision cleared, the old gook was up and turned around and weaving back toward the street. The pain, too, was sidling away.

Patsy tried again to lift his hands up to his belly, and this time they moved. They seemed stronger. He wiggled his fingers through the wetness of his blood, feeling for the edges of the wound, afraid of finding loops of bowel waiting for him.

He missed the slit on the first pass. And missed it on the second. How could that happen? It had been at least a foot long and had gaped open a good three or four inches, right there to the left of his belly button. He tried again, carefully this time…

…and found a thin little ridge of flesh.

But no opening.

He raised his head – he hadn’t been able to do that before – and looked down at his belly. His shirt and pants were a bloody mess, but he couldn’t see any guts sticking out. And he couldn’t see any wound, either. Just a dark wet mound of flesh.

If he wasn’t so goddamn fat he could see down there! He rolled onto his side – God, he was stronger! – and pushed himself up to his knees to where he could slump his butt onto his heels, all the time keeping at least one hand tight over his belly. But nothing came out, or even pushed against his hand. He pulled his shirt open.

The wound was closed, replaced by a thin, purplish vertical line.

Patsy felt woozy again. What’s going on here?

He was in a coma – that had to be it. He was dreaming this.

But everything was so real – the rough ground beneath his knees, the congealing red wetness of the blood on his shirt, the sounds from the street, even the smell of the garbage around him. All so real…

Bracing himself against the wall, he inched his way up to his feet. His knees were wobbly and for a moment he thought they’d give out on him. But they held and now he was standing.

He was afraid to look down, afraid he’d see himself still on the ground. Finally, he took a quick glance. Nothing there but two clotted puddles of blood, one on each side of where he’d been lying.

He tore off the rest of the ruined shirt and began walking – very carefully at first – toward the street. Any moment now he would wake up or die, and this craziness would stop. No doubt ’bout that. But until then he was going to play out this little fantasy to the end.

“Dat-Tay-Vao” is available in the collection Soft & Others or in the 2009 reissue of The Touch

1983

JACK: SECRET HISTORIES

The child who would become Repairman Jack was conceived shortly after Rasalom’s reincarnation. His genetic makeup leaves him uniquely suited to be the Heir. Neither he nor his parents are aware that he has been designated.

He makes his first appearance in the Secret History of the World with the first of his Teen Trilogy. He spends much of his time in the fabled Jersey Pinelands, rich in Secret History lore and relics of the First Age.

Back in 2006 my grandson, a precocious reader, wanted to read my Repairman Jack novels. But they weren’t for him – the language and situations weren’t appropriate for a seven-year old. Still, I wanted to share Jack with him. The only solution I could see was to tell a few young adult Jack stories to hold him over until he was old enough for the adult books.

So I decided to go back to 1983 when Jack is fourteen years old. It’s a magical time in his life, the last summer before high school when he’s discovering his fixing talent. I’ve set it on the edge of the mysterious and legendary New Jersey Pine Barrens where strange lights jump from tree to tree and the Jersey Devil supposedly roams. I peopled it with weird characters and places and pitched the idea to Tor. They hooked me up with one of their teen editors and gave me a contract for 3 so-called Young-Adult novels.

I say "so-called" because the writing process wasn't much different from my adult work and the style is virtually identical. I've striven over the years for a clean, lean style, tailored to the pace of the thrillers I write. To my delight I found it fits a younger audience equally well. At least that's what a focus group showed: Kids who often took up to a month to finish a book were polishing off Jack: Secret Histories over a weekend and looking for more.

Jack: Secret Histories made a number of recommended lists for middle-grade readers.

Here’s how the first book opens…

Jack: Secret Histories

(sample)

MONDAY

They discovered the body on a rainy afternoon

1

“Aren’t we there yet?” Eddie said, puffing behind him.

Jack glanced over his shoulder to where Eddie Connell labored through the sandy soil on his bike. His face was red and beaded with perspiration, sweat soaked through his red Police T-shirt, darkening Sting’s face. Chunky Eddie wasn’t built for speed. He wore his sandy hair shorter than most, which tended to make him look even heavier than he was. Eddie’s idea of exercise was a day on the couch playing Pole Position on his… new Atari 5200. Jack envied that machine. He was stuck with a 2600.

“Only Weezy knows,” Jack said.

He wasn’t sweating like Eddie, but he felt clammy all over. With good reason. The August heat was stifling here in the Pine Barrens, and the humidity made it worse. Whatever breeze existed out there couldn’t penetrate the close-packed, spindly trees.

They were following Eddie’s older sister Weezy – really Louise, but no one ever called her that. She liked to remind people that she’d been “Weezy” long before The Jeffersons ever showed up on the tube.

She was pedaling her banana-seat Schwinn along one of the firebreak trails that crisscrossed the million-plus acres of mostly uninhabited woodland known as the Jersey Pine Barrens. A potentially dangerous place if you didn’t know what you were doing or where you were going. Every year hunters wandered in, looking for deer, and were never seen again. Locals would wink and say the Jersey Devil snagged another one. But Jack knew the JD was just a folk tale. Well, he was pretty sure. Truth was, the missing hunters were usually amateurs who came ill equipped and got lost, wandering around in circles until they died of thirst and starvation.

At least that was what people said. Though that didn’t explain why so few of the bodies were ever found.

But the Barrens didn’t scare Jack and Eddie and Weezy. At least not during the day. They’d grown up on the edge of the Pinelands and knew this section of it like the backs of their hands. Couldn’t know all of it, of course. The Barrens hid places no human eye had ever seen.

Yet as familiar as he was with the area, Jack still got a creepy sensation when riding into the trees and seeing the forty-foot scrub pines get thicker and thicker, crowding the edges of the path, and then leaning over with their crooked, scraggly branches seeming to reach for him. He could almost believe they were shuffling off the path ahead of him and then moving back in to close it off behind.

“See that sign?” Eddie said, pointing to a passing tree. “Maybe we should listen.”

Jack glanced at the orange letters blaring from glossy black tin:

NO FISHING

NO HUNTING

NO TRAPPING

NO TRESPASSING

No big deal. The signs dotted just about every other tree on Old Man Foster’s land, so common they became part of the scenery.

“Well,” he said, “we’re not doing the first three.”

“But we’re doing the fourth.”

“Criminals is what we are!” Jack raised a fist. “Criminals!”

“Easy with that.” Eddie looked around. “Old Man Foster might hear you.”

Jack called to the girl riding twenty feet ahead of them. “Hey, Weez! When do we get there?”

She usually kept her shoulder-length dark hair down but she’d tied it back in a ponytail for the trip. She wore a black-and-white – mostly black – Bauhaus T-shirt and black jeans. Jack and Eddie wore jeans too, but theirs were faded blue and cut off above the knees. Weezy’s were full length. Jack couldn’t remember if he’d ever seen her bare legs. Probably white as snow.

“Not much farther now,” she called without looking around.

“Sounds like Papa Smurf,” Eddie grumbled. “This is stupidacious.”

Jack turned back to Eddie. “Want to trade bikes?”

Jack rode his BMX. He’d let some air out of the tires for better grip in the sand and they were doing pretty well.

“Nah.” Eddie patted the handlebars of his slim-tired English street bike. “I’m all right.”

“Whoa!” Jack heard Weezy say.

He looked around and saw she’d stopped. He had to jam on his brakes to keep from running into her. Eddie flew past both of them and stopped ahead of his sister.

“Is this it, Smurfette?” he said.

Weezy shook her head. “Almost.”

She had eyes almost as dark as her hair, and a round face, normally milk pale, made paler by the dark eyeliner she wore. But she was flushed now with heat and excitement. The color looked good on her. Made her look almost… healthy, a look Weezy did not pursue.

Jack liked Weezy. She was only four months older, but his January birthday had landed him a year behind her in school. Come next month they’d both be in Southern Burlington County Regional High, just a couple of miles away. But she’d be a soph and he a lowly frosh. Maybe they’d be able to spend more time together. And then again, maybe not. Did sophs hang with freshmen? Were they allowed?

She wasn’t pretty by most standards. Skinny, almost boyish, although her hips seemed to be flaring a little now. Back in grammar school a lot of the kids had called her “Wednesday Addams” because of her round face and perpetually dark clothes. If she ever decided to wear her hair in pigtails, the resemblance would be scary.

But whatever her looks, Jack thought she was the most interesting girl – no, make that most interesting person he’d ever met. She read things no one else read, and viewed the world in a light different from anyone else.

She pointed to their right. “What on Earth’s going on there?”

Jack saw a small clearing with a low wet spot known in these parts as a spong. But around the rim of the spong stood about a dozen sticks of odd shapes and sizes, leaning this way and that.

“Who cares?” Eddie said. “If this isn’t what you dragged us out here to see, let’s keep going.”

After hopping off her bike, she leaned it against a tree and started for the clearing.

“Just give me a minute.”

His curiosity piqued, Jack leaned his bike against hers and followed. The knee-high grass slapped against his sweaty lower legs, making them itch. A glance back showed Eddie sitting on the sand in the shade of a pine. Jack caught up to Weezy as they neared the spong.

“They just look like dead branches someone’s stuck in the sand.”

“But why?” Weezy said.

“For nothing better to do?”

She looked at him with that tolerant smile – the smile she showed a world that just didn’t get it. At least not in her terms.

“Everything that happens out here happens for a reason,” she said in the ooh-spooky tone she used whenever she talked about the Barrens.

He knew Weezy loved the Barrens. She studied them, knew everything about them, and had been delighted back in 1979, at the tender age of eleven, when the state passed a conservation act to preserve them.

She gestured at the sticks, not a dozen feet away now. “Can you imagine anyone coming out here just to poke sticks into the ground for no reason at all? I don’t–” She stopped, grabbed Jack’s arm, and pointed. “Look! What’d I tell you?”

Jack kind of liked the feel of her fingers gripping his forearm, but he followed her point. When he saw what she was talking about, he broke free and hurried forward.

“Traps! A whole mess of traps.”

“Yeah,” Weezy said, coming up behind him. “The nasty leg-hold type. Some dirty, rotten…”

As her voice trailed off Jack glanced at her and flinched at her enraged expression. She looked a little scary.

“But they’ve all been sprung.” He started walking around the spong. “Every single one of them.”

“Whoever did this is my hero,” she said, following close behind. “Didn’t I tell you that everything that happens out here–”

“–happens for a reason,” Jack said, finishing for her.

Clear as day that someone had set up a slew of traps around the perimeter of the spong, planning to trap any animals that stopped by to drink from the water in its basin.

And just as clear, someone else had come by with a bunch of dead branches and used them to tap the trigger plates, springing the traps and making them harmless. In some cases the steel jaws had snapped right through the dead wood; in others it had only dented it, leaving the branch upright.

“Got to be at least a couple dozen along here,” Jack said.

“Not anymore.”

She bent, grabbed one of the trap chains, and started working its anchor loose from the sand.

“What are you doing?”

“Watch.”

As the coiled anchor came free, Weezy grabbed it and the trap itself, then hurled the whole assembly into the spong. The two ends swung around on their chain like a boomerang before splashing into the shallow water and disappearing beneath the surface.

She turned to him, brushing the sand from her hands.

“Come on, Jack. We’ve got work to do.”

He stared at her, surprised by the wild look in her eyes…

“But–”

“These rats don’t check their traps for three or four days at a time.”

“How do you know all this?”

“I read, Jack.”

“So do I.”

“Yeah, but you read fifty-year-old magazines. I read about what’s really going on in the world.” She pointed to a trap. “Three days in one of those. Think about it.”

He did, imagining himself a fox or possum or raccoon with a broken leg caught in the steel jaws, hungry and thirsty, with water just a couple of dozen feet away but unable to get to it. It made his gut crawl.

Without a word, he bent and worked an anchor free of the ground, then followed Weezy’s example and tossed the trap into the water.

“Two down. How many more to go?”

He found her staring at him with a strange light in her eyes.

“About thirty.”

“Then we’re gonna need help.” He turned and waved to Eddie. “Over here! You gotta see this!”

As Eddie made his way toward them, Jack and Weezy bent again to the task of ripping out the traps and hurling them into the drink.

Eddie arrived and gawked at what they were doing. “Are you guys crazy? You can’t do that!”

Jack held up a trap. “Really? Watch.”

He tossed it into the water.

Eddie slapped his hands against the side of his head. “What if Old Man Foster comes along and catches us?”

Weezy said, “Well, his signs do say, ‘No Trapping.’ We’re just helping him out.”

“That means no trapping by anybody else. We could be in hellacious big trouble.”

Jack doubted that. Old Man Foster was just a name. No one had ever seen the guy. Everyone knew he owned this big piece of the Barrens and that was about it. Though nobody saw them go up, fresh No Trespassing signs appeared every year. Sometimes poachers would take them down, but before you knew it they’d be back up again.

Another mystery of the Pine Barrens. A very minor one.

As for Eddie, Jack wasn’t sure if he was acting as the voice of good sense, or trying to duck the work of pulling out the traps. He hated anything more strenuous than working a joystick.

“Look,” Jack told him. “The sooner we get this done and get on our way, the less chance we’ll have of being caught. So come on. Get to it.”

Eddie obeyed, but not without his trademarked grumbling.

“Okay, okay. But I don’t have to ask whose idea this was. It’s got my crazy sister written all over it.”

In a flash Weezy was in his face. “What did you say?”

Eddie gave her a sheepish look. “Nothing.”

“You did! I heard you! Hasn’t this been talked about a million times?” Eddie nodded without looking at her. “Right,” she said. “So you keep your mouth shut or someone’s going to hear about this.”

Eddie sighed. “Okay, okay,” and returned to working on a trap.

Baffled, Jack caught Weezy’s eye as she turned from her brother. “What–?”

“Family matter, Jack.” She turned away. “Don’t worry about it.”

Jack wasn’t worried. But he couldn’t help but wonder. He’d known these two all his life. What was this all about?

2

“Okay,” Weezy said, stopping her bike. “Here we are.”

After sinking all the traps, they’d pedaled like mad away from the spong. Along the way, Jack had wished for a few clouds to hide the sun and cool the air, but the sky ignored him. At least now they’d arrived at their original destination.

Jack followed her gaze. “It’s just some burned-out patch.”

Fires were common in the Barrens during the summer. Tourists and nature lovers came to camp and sometimes got careless with their campfires or Coleman stoves or cigarettes. Same with poachers. And many times nature herself took the blame, setting a tree ablaze with a bolt of lightning.

Usually a ranger in a fire tower, like the one on Apple Pie Hill, would spot the smoke and send out an alarm. Then the local and county volunteer fire companies would go racing to the scene along the fire trails. But the smaller fires started during a storm often would burn only an acre or two before being doused by the rain.

“Not just any burnt-out patch.” She motioned Jack and Eddie to follow. “Come on. I’m going to show you something no one else – except for me – has seen in a long, long time.”

Eddie said, “Aw, come on, Smurfette–”

She stopped and turned to him. “And you can cut the Smurfette bit. Unless you like ‘Pugsley.’ ”

“Okay, okay. But what about the firemen who put out the fire? They must have seen it.”

“No firemen for this one.”

Eddie snorted. “You psychic now?”

“Check it out.” She gestured around them. “What’s missing?”

Eddie and Jack did full turns.

“Green trees?” Jack said.

Weezy shook her head. “Litter. There’s no litter. Firefighters always leave coffee cups, candy wrappers, Coke cans, Gatorade bottles, all sorts of stuff. But not here. Ergo…”

Jack knew from his father that ergo was Latin for “therefore,” but a glance at Eddie showed he hadn’t a clue.

He checked the ground again. Not even a gum wrapper. Weezy didn’t miss a trick.

As they followed her into the burned-out area, Jack noticed how the pine trunks had been charred coal black. The remaining needles high up were a dead brown, and the usual spindly little branches sticking out here and there lower down the trunks had been burned off. But the trees weren't dead. Every single trunk was sprouting new little branchlets, pushing them through the scorched crust of the bark and sporting baby needles of bright green. Everyone had heard of the Sears Diehard battery. These were nature’s die-hard trees.

As she’d done all day, Weezy led the way, winding through the blackened trunks until she came to a break in the trees.

“Here’s where the mound begins.”

“Mound?” Eddie said. “Where?”

But Jack saw what she meant. They stood at the tip of where two linear mounds, each a couple of feet high and maybe a yard wide, converged to a point. Both ran off at angles between the blackened trees.

“Like some giant gopher,” Eddie said.

Weezy shook her head. “Except look how smooth they are. And how straight. Nobody knows it’s here, and I never would have noticed it if the fire hadn’t cleared all the undergrowth. I haven’t explored the whole thing, so I–”

“You were out here alone?” Jack said.

She nodded. “You know me. I like to explore. Who else is going to come along? You?”

His two part-time jobs didn’t leave Jack much time to explore the Barrens, especially not to the extent Weezy did. She’d spend hours digging for arrowheads or other artifacts. The only reason he was out here today was because Mr. Rosen closed his store on Mondays.

He smiled and shrugged. “Beautiful teenage girl alone in the woods… might meet a Big Bad Wolf.”

She grinned and punched him on the shoulder. “Get out! Now you’re making fun of me.”

“Maybe a little, but you’ve got to be careful, Weez.”

She sighed. “Yeah, you’re right. But they’ve got to find me first.” She shrugged. “Anyway, I got a little spooked here before I could explore the rest of the mound, so that’s–”

“You? Spooked?” Eddie laughed. “You are a spook. Nothing spooks you.”

“Well, this place does.” She pointed along the lengths of the two ridges to where they faded into the trees. “See how nothing grows on the mounds? I mean, isn’t that weird?”

Jack saw what she meant. Low-lying scrub – most of it scorched and blackened – crowded around the trees and spread across every square inch of sand between them. Everywhere except on the mounds.

Yeah. Weird, all right. Sand was sand. What made the mounds different?

Or was it a single mound, angling in different directions?

“Feel it,” she said, patting the surface. “It’s still sand, but it’s hard. Like it hasn’t been disturbed for so long it’s formed some kind of crust.”

Jack ran his fingers along the surface, then pressed. The sand wouldn’t yield. But something else… an unpleasant tingle in his fingertips. He pulled them away and looked at them. The tingling stopped. He glanced at Weezy and found her staring at him.

“So it isn’t just me. You feel it too.”

“Feel what?” Eddie said, rubbing his hands over the hard surface. “I don’t feel anything.”

Weezy was still staring at Jack. “Now you know what spooked me.”

She reached around to a rear pocket and pulled out the small spiral notebook and pencil she never went anywhere without.

“I’ll bet somebody designed this in a special shape. Let’s see if we can figure it out.”

“What do you mean, ‘special shape’?”

“A lot of these mounds are ancient – thousands of years old.”

“You mean, like, burial mounds?”

Jack had heard of those. The Lenape Indians used to inhabit the pines.

Weezy shook her head. “Some of the most mysterious have nothing to do with burials. Take the Serpent Mound in Ohio. It curves back and forth like a snake for over a quarter mile. And get this – nobody knows how old it is. This could be something like that.” Her face brightened as she smiled. “And I discovered it. I’ve got to get this diagrammed.”

Wondering how she knew all this stuff, Jack watched her draw a few lines on her pad, then move off, weaving through the trees as she followed the mound to the right. Jack and Eddie followed close behind through air heavy with the smell of burned wood. This was Weezy’s show, but Jack was getting into it. Something about these mounds and the way nothing grew on them gave him a funny feeling in his gut, but he had to admit he was fascinated.

“Oh, look at this,” she said after she’d gone maybe twenty feet. “Another mound crosses here.” She drew some more lines. “This is getting confusing.”

“Hey,” Eddie said.

Jack turned and saw him standing atop the mound with his arms spread.

“Eddie–” Weezy began

“You want to map these mounds, right? Well, instead of ducking through all those trees, doesn’t it make more sense to follow the mounds themselves? It’ll be a lot less boracious.”

Jack turned to Weezy. “You know, that’s a great idea.”

Weezy hesitated, then shrugged. “I guess everybody has a good idea in them,” she muttered. “Even Eddie.”

Jack bowed and made a flourish toward the mound. “Ladies first.”

She smiled and faked a curtsy. “Why, thank you, kind sir.”

As the three of them began walking the mound, the sky darkened. Jack looked up and saw a menacing pile of clouds scudding in from the west, blotting out the sun. Weezy shaded her eyes as she stared skyward.

“Shoot. We’ve got trouble.”

“Looks like a thunderhead,” Eddie said.

She nodded. “Cumulonimbus – piled high. Going to be a bad one.”

“‘Cumulonimbus’?” Jack had to laugh. Weezy never ceased to amaze him. “How do you know this stuff?”

She frowned. “I’m not sure.”

“Do you sit down and memorize everything you read?”

She shook her head. “I don’t have to. If I read something once, it’s there. I never forget it. Ever. At least not so far.”

No wonder she got straight A’s. Jack would give anything – anything – for that power.

Thunder rumbled in the distance.

“Hurry,” she said. “I want to get this done before the downpour.”

She started quick-walking along the mound until she came to another intersection. As she stopped to mark in her notebook, Jack looked around for Eddie and spotted him a couple of dozen feet back. He was down on one knee, fiddling with his sneaker lace.

“Come on, Eddie. Don’t want the Jersey Devil to catch you.”

He grinned. “You kidding? I have JD sausages for breakfast every morning."

He jumped up and started trotting toward them. When he neared he jumped and landed inches in front of Jack.

“Boo!”

More thunder then, but another sound too. As Eddie’s feet thumped onto the surface of the mound, they kept on going, breaking through the outer shell with a crunch.

Jack looked down and saw Eddie’s sneakers sunk ankle deep in the softer sand within.

“Jeez, man! What’d you do?”

He heard Weezy hurry up behind him and gasp. “Oh, Eddie! How could you?”

Eddie’s face reddened – whether with anger or embarrassment, Jack couldn’t tell.

“Hey, I didn’t–”

“You are the most unbelievable klutz! This mound’s sat here undisturbed for hundreds, maybe thousands of years, and you’re here, what, ten minutes, and already you’ve desecrated it!”

“It was a soft spot! How could I know?”

Lightning flashed, followed quickly by a roar of thunder that rattled Jack’s fillings. He looked up at a sky completely lidded with dark clouds looking ready to burst. Jeez, this storm was coming fast.

“Time to take cover, guys,” he said.

He grabbed Weezy’s arm and started pulling her back toward the bikes. He knew if he didn’t she’d probably stay in the open, storm or no storm, drawing her diagram. She didn’t fight him. Eddie followed.

Just as they reached the bikes, the sky opened like a bursting dam. They huddled in the center of a thick copse of young pines.

“Under a tree,” Weezy said. “The worst place to be in a storm.”

Jack knew that, but didn’t see as they had much choice. Even under the trees they were getting soaked.

“In case you haven’t noticed, Weez,” Jack said, “we’re in the middle of the Pine Barrens. If you know of a place without trees, I’m all ears.”

Weezy said nothing more, just crouched on her haunches, her eyes closed and her fingers in her ears. Eddie too. They both jumped with every thunderclap.

Jack didn’t get that. He loved thunderstorms – their fury, their unpredictability, their deafening light shows fascinated him. Same with his father. Many a summer night they’d sit together on the front porch and watch a storm approach, peak, and move on. Sometimes Dad would drive him over to Old Town where they’d park within sight of the Lightning Tree. For some reason no one could figure, the long-dead tree took a hit from every storm that passed overhead.

The thunder grew louder, the lightning flashed brighter, the rain fell harder. The world funneled down to the copse and little else. Nothing was visible beyond their clump of trees. Water cascaded through the branches and swirled around their feet. Might as well have been in the shower – except Jack wished he could have cranked up the hot water handle.

He felt his Converse All-Stars filling with water.

Swell.

3

After a couple of forevers, the storm tapered off. When the rain finally stopped they stepped out of the copse and shook themselves off.

Jack took off his T-shirt and wrung the water out of it. Eddie followed suit. Weezy didn’t have that luxury. Her Bauhaus shirt was plastered to her; she pulled it free of her skin as best she could. Her soaked hair looked almost black, her bangs were plastered to her forehead, and her ponytail had become a rat tail.

“Look at us,” she said. “Three drowned mice.”

“At least we didn’t get hit by lightning,” Eddie said. “Let’s get home. I need to dry off.”

“But I haven’t mapped the mound yet.”

Eddie rolled his eyes. “You’ve gotta be kidding! You can come back any time–”

“Just give me a few minutes.”

“Come on, Eddie,” Jack said, nudging him with an elbow. “What difference is a few more minutes going to make?”

“Okay, okay. I’ll stay with the bikes.”

She pulled out her notepad and regarded it with dismay. “Soaked!”

But that didn’t stop her. She hurried ahead, hopped on the mound, and began retracing her steps. The sun popped out as Jack followed. Now he welcomed it.

Weezy stopped where Eddie had broken through the crust and pointed to the edges.

“See this? I was so mad at him I didn’t notice before, but it’s really weird.”

Jack saw what she meant. Eddie had shattered a four- or five-foot length of the crust into about a zillion irregular pieces, but the edges of the broken area – the near, the far, and both sides near ground level – were perfectly straight. Could have been cut by an electric saw.

The rain had done a number on the soft sand within the mound, washing it out and fanning it around the break like a cloud. Jack didn’t know what kind of cloud it resembled, but he was sure Weezy could tell him.

He kicked over a random shard of crust and spotted something shiny and black beneath it. Before he could react, Weezy was on her knees and all over it.

“What’s this?”

She started scooping away the surrounding wet sand, gradually revealing a black cube the size of a softball. Gently, cautiously, she wriggled her fingers beneath it.

“Why don’t you just pick it up?” Jack said.

“Because it may be attached to something.” Her fingers must have met on its underside because suddenly she lifted it free and held it up. “Heavy!”

She laid it on the ground between them and began to examine it, tilting it a little this way and a little that.

Jack knelt opposite her. “What do you think it is?”

She shook her head, looking as baffled as he felt. “I don’t know. Some kind of stone – onyx, maybe? It’s got no writing on it, but I get this feeling it’s… old.” She looked up at him. “Know what I mean?”

Jack couldn’t say why, but he knew exactly what she meant.

“Yeah. Very old.”

“And where there’s one there’s probably others.” Her eyes were wide with wonder and excitement. “Help me, Jack?”

He laughed. “Try and stop me.”

He wanted one of those cubes for himself.

So they started digging – not easy in the wet sand. But they kept coming up empty. Frustration was beginning to nibble at Jack when his fingertips scraped against a hard surface.

“Got something!”

He dug his fingers down on each side of whatever it was and pulled it up.

And found himself looking into the empty eye sockets of a rotting human head.

He stared in mute, open-mouthed, grossed-out shock. Beside him, Weezy screamed.

You can find the rest here: Jack: Secret Histories

1983

JACK: SECRET CIRCLES

The second volume of the Teen Trilogy – in which Ernst Drexler II and the Septimus Order (and the Barrens, of course) play a central role. Also, Jack gets a look at one of the Seven Infernals. Another Infernal will trigger a harrowing episode in his adult life. And Jack has a near-fatal run-in with a survivor of the First Age.

I never saw myself writing for kids, especially since I already have a fair number of teen readers, mostly sixteen and up. But a motley array of forces converged to goose me into writing novels geared toward the under-fifteen crowd. If I’m going to write a book about Jack as a teen, why not aim it at teens (and maybe hook some new readers in the process).

I was told at that time that I was the first author to do this – take an adult series character and do young adult novels about him. I don’t know if it’s true. I do know George Lucas did it with young Indy, but that was film, not prose. Since I started with Jack, other writers have followed suit.

As luck would have it, I’d already placed Jack’s hometown in Burlington County, which juts into the mysterious and fabled Jersey Pine Barrens. Perfect. I could work all sorts of magic in a million acres of wilderness with places no human eyes have ever seen, where strange lights jump from tree to tree, and the Jersey Devil supposedly roams. I peopled his town with weird characters and places – like an old woman (with a dog) who's supposedly a witch; the town drunk who’s rumored to be able to heal with a touch but always wears gloves (you’ll recognize him if you’ve read “Dat-Tay-Vao”); Ernst Drexler II, son of Ernst from “Aryans and Absinthe” shows up. And then there’s USED, the store that sells old… stuff.

Here’s how it begins…

JACK: SECRET CIRCLES

(sample)

SATURDAY

Little Cody Bockman disappeared on a rainy morning

1

Jack dodged puddles as he pedaled his BMX along Adams Street to the Connell house. Even though the sky was overcast now, the air felt dry. He hoped it would last. He was sick to death of rain. People were saying this could turn out to be the rainiest September on record and –

“Hey!” he shouted as he almost collided with a little kid scooting by on a red bike. “Cody!”

The kid braked and almost fell off his bike.

“Jack! Jack! I can do it!”

“What?”

“Look! No training wheels!”

Cody Bockman was five and lived two doors down from Jack. His long hair was a blond tangle and his blue eyes sparkled with excitement. Cute kid, but a little wild man. Jack liked him except when he attached himself and followed him around like a dog. Somehow he always chose times when Jack felt like being alone.

“That’s cool, Code.” Jack looked around. Not an adult in sight. “Your folks know you’re out here?”

“No, but it’s okay.”

“Yeah? You mean, if I go back and ask your mom and dad if it’s all right for you to be cruising the streets, they’ll say it’s fine with them?”

Cody looked down. “Well…”

Jack put on a stern look. “You gonna go or am I gonna have to take you back?”

“I’m goin’!”

He turned his bike around and pedaled a wobbly path back toward Jefferson. Jack watched him a little, then continued on to the Connells’.

Weezy’s brother Eddie had asked him over to play, Berzerk, the new game his father had bought him for his Atari 5200. The game was simple and so fun when you could trick the robots into walking into walls or shooting each other, but so nerve racking when that deadly smiley face came bouncing through.

But no videogames today. He’d played enough during the rains. This morning he was going to drag Eddie off the couch and into the sunlight. No easy task, considering Eddie’s weight and resistance to any activity that involved moving more than his thumbs.

As Jack glided past the unlidded garbage cans at the curb – Wednesday and Saturday were garbage days in Johnson – he noticed a couple of familiar items from Weezy’s room in the nearer container. He stopped for a closer look and saw copies of Fortean Times and Fate. Weezy treasured those weird paranormal magazines. Why was she throwing them out?

Maybe she was in a cleaning mood. She had all sorts of moods lately. Spin the dial and see who appeared.

Or maybe she didn’t even know. Her parents were always on her case for not being like other teenage girls. Had they simply gone in and started tossing stuff? That wasn’t right.

He spotted a half-folded photo, an aerial shot of the Pinelands, the million acres of woods beyond the town’s eastern edge. He recognized the scene: an excavation of the mound where just last month he and Weezy had found a corpse and a mysterious little pyramid.

The sight of it released a flood of memories… most of them bad. He’d blocked them out, but now they were back. The dead man was not simply dead, he'd been murdered – ritually murdered – and his discovery had triggered other deaths, all seemingly of natural causes, but all weirdly connected. Then Jack had learned the cause, and it hadn’t been natural at all. But he couldn’t talk about it because he had no proof and everyone – even Weezy – would think he was crazy.

And the pyramid…shiny, black, embossed with strange glyphs… Weezy had fallen in love with it, memorizing every detail of the symbols on its sides and the weird grid inside the box that had held it. It had turned out to be older that it seemed – much older than anything man-made should be.

Then it had disappeared.

And Weezy hadn’t been quite the same since. Jack had felt the loss too – such a neat artifact – but not like Weezy. She’d taken it like the loss of her best friend. But more than that, she was convinced it had been stolen and was sure she knew the culprit… all without a shred of proof.

So he couldn’t believe she’d throw away this photo.

He snagged it from the can and stuck it in his back pocket as he hopped up the front steps and knocked on the door.

“Door’s open,” he heard a man’s voice call from inside.

As Jack stepped in, Mr. Connell poked his crewcut head around a corner and grinned. “Eddie said you’d be coming. He’s in the family room.”

“Is Weezy here?”

“Yeah. Hey, Weez!”

“What?” Her voice floated from upstairs.

“Jack’s here!”

Weezy appeared at the top of the stairway in her customary black jeans and a black T-shirt. She had dark eyes and pale skin. She’d gone a little heavier than usual on the eyeliner today. She held a book in her right hand, her index finger poked between two pages. She’d been letting her dark hair grow and today she’d parted it in the middle and braided it into a pair of pigtails.

“Hey, Jack. Come on up.”

“Going for the Wednesday Addams look?” he said as he took the steps two at a time.

“Well, it’s the weekend and I’m full of woe.”

He followed her into her room, christened the “Bat Cave” by her brother. With all the shades drawn, a dark purple bedspread, gargoyles peering down from her bookshelves, and a creepy Bauhaus poster on the wall, it lived up to the name.

“About anything in particular?”

“The usual – everything.” She belly flopped onto the bed and opened her book.

“What’s so interesting?”

“Just got it from the library. All about pre-Sumerian civilizations. What’s up?”

Jack pulled the photo from his pocket and held it up. “I found this in your garbage can.”

She glanced up with a smile. “Are you Dumpster diving now?” Then her gaze fixed on the wrinkled photo. “Isn’t that…?”

“Yeah. Never thought you’d toss it out.”

She was up in a flash grabbing it from him.

“I didn’t.” Her expression turned furious. “They have no right!”

As she started for her door Jack blocked her way. She had a wild look in her eyes. Jack had seen that look a few times before when she’d lost it, and she seemed ready to lose it now.

“Easy, Weezy. Could you maybe wait on this? You’re going to put me smack dab in the middle of the fight.”

For a second he thought she might hit him. He didn’t know what he’d do if she tried. He was relieved when the look faded.

“Because you found it?”

He nodded. He didn’t want to become a player in the ongoing tug of war between Weezy and her parents – mostly her father – who wanted her to be what they called a “normal girl” and what she called a “bow head.”

“You know,” she said, her voice thickening as she stalked about her room, “if they’re so unhappy with me, why don’t they just send me off to boarding school or something so they don’t have to look at me?”

Jack didn’t like that idea one bit. Who would he hang with? He tried to lighten the moment by clutching his hands over his heart and giving her his best approximation of a lost-puppy look.

“But-but-but wouldn’t you miss meeee?”

It didn’t work. She was off to the races. She’d always been hard to stop once she got rolling, but almost impossible since the disappearance of the pyramid. She’d gotten a little scary lately.

“I’m going to be fifteen next week! I’ve got a brain, why don’t they want me to use it? They have no right to throw out my stuff!” She stopped her pacing. “Maybe I should pull a Marcie Kurek! That’d show ’em!”

Marcie Kurek was a runaway who’d been a soph at the high school last year. She lived in Shamong. One night she said she was going out to visit a friend and never showed up. No one had seen her since.

Weezy turned and threw the photo on the floor.

Jack knew she tended to leave her stuff all over the house, a perfect invitation for her folks to dump the things they didn’t approve of, especially anything that referred to what she called the Secret History of the World.

The Secret History was her passion – her conviction that accepted history was a collection of lies carefully constructed and arranged to hide what was really going on in the world, and conceal the hidden agenda and identities of those pulling the strings. Ancient secret societies manipulating events throughout the ages…

People – especially her family – tended to roll their eyes once she got started on it. Jack too, though not as quickly as he used to. He’d seen and heard things last month that he couldn’t explain… he didn’t know if they fit into Weezy’s Secret History, didn’t know if they fit anywhere, or if they were even real.

Weezy was convinced that the pyramid they’d found was connected to the Secret History. And maybe it was… this was a picture of the mound where they’d found the body and the artifact, or rather what was left after those strange government men had dug it up in the night.

He glanced at it now on the floor and was once again struck by the mound’s strange outline. As he looked he noticed something to the right of the mound…

He picked it up for a closer look… a dark object or structure in a small clearing. He’d never noticed it before. But then again, the photo had been in Weezy’s possession all this time, so he’d never had much chance to study it.

“Hey, Weez. Where’s your magnifying glass? Or did your folks throw that away too?”

“Not funny.”

She plucked a magnifier with a two-inch lens from a shelf above her desk and handed it to him. Jack poised it over the area in question and felt a tingle of excitement across his neck as it grew larger and came into focus.

“Oh, man, you’ve got to see this.” He passed the lens and photo to her, then tapped the spot. “Right there.”

He watched her brow furrow as she moved the lens up and down and around.

“Hmmph. Never noticed.” She glanced up. “Could be just a big rock.”

“Yeah? Take another look. Count the sides.”

He watched her eyes narrow to a squint as she complied, then widen. She wore an entirely different expression when she looked up this time.

“Six.”

“Yeah. Just like our pyramid.”

A light sparked in her eyes. “Actually it had seven if you count the base. But this is bigger. Much bigger.” She frowned. “Too big for them to steal.”

Jack knew who “them” were but didn’t want her to get started on that now.

“You got that right. Want to take a look?”

“You kidding? Of course I–”

“There you are!”

Jack turned and saw Weezy’s portly brother standing in the doorway, twisting a Rubik’s Cube. He had short, sandy hair and a pudgy body, and his striped rugby shirt gave him a definite Pugsley look. Jack was tempted to remark on the Addams Family theme here in the Connell house, but held his tongue. Eddie wouldn’t take kindly to the Pugsley comparison.

But if Cousin Itt showed up…

“Hey Eddie. I was just–”

“No Berzerk today, man,” Eddie said, looking miffed. “My dad’s booting me out of the house. Wants me to ‘enjoy the outdoors.’ Can you believe it?” He shook his head sadly. “Boracious.”

Eddie was not a fan of the outdoors, unless it meant sitting in the shade with a copy of Uncanny X-Men.

Jack pointed to the Rubik’s Cube that had become Eddie’s latest obsession. “Hey, anytime you want me to straighten that out for you, let me know.”

He gave a wry grin. “Yeah, right. Like you could.”

Jack shrugged. “Just trying to help the helpless.”

Eddie glanced at his sister stretched on the bed and his grin turned evil. “You too, cave girl. He wants us both out in the”–he grabbed his throat and made a strangled sound–”fresh air.”

“We were just leaving,” Jack said.

“Where to?”

“The Pines.”

Eddie shook his head. “No way. Last time I was in there with you two we found a dead guy, and pretty soon a whole bunch of guys were dead.”

Jack shrugged. “Look at it this way: How many times can that happen? Chances of finding another dead guy are almost zilch.”

“You guarantee that?”

“Let’s go,” was all Jack said.

He knew nothing was guaranteed in the Pines.

2

They finally convinced him to come along. Jack was leading the way off Adams onto North Franklin when he spotted a familiar blond-haired kid on a bike.

“Hey, Cody!” Jack called. “I thought you were going back home!”

“I am! I am!”

“Did you stop off in Canada along the way?”

The kid laughed. “No!”

Jack pointed toward Jefferson Street. “Better get back before your folks find out and sell you to the circus.”

He grinned as he pedaled away. “That’d be soooo cool!”

Jack watched him turn the corner onto Jefferson and disappear from view, then signaled Weezy and Eddie back into motion.

“You handled that like a pro,” Weezy said as they rode.

“Yeah, well, I’m positive his parents don’t know he’s out here. My mother knows his folks and she says he wears them out. Never stops moving.”

She slapped Eddie on the arm. “That’s where all your energy went. Cody Bockman stole it.”

“I’m gonna sue,” Eddie said. “No, wait. If I get it back I’ll have to run around all the time. Forget it!”

Jack said, “Check it out,” as he pointed to a colorful poster on one of the telephone poles.

It announced the arrival of the Taber & Sons circus. The show parked itself near Johnson for a few days every fall. Not a real full-blown circus like Ringling Brothers, just some rides, a few animals, a tent show, and a midway. The local dates had been inked in.

“Hey, it opens tomorrow,” Weezy said. “Maybe later we can go watch them set up.”

Eddie grinned. “Count me out. Watching people work wears me out.”

“Look!” Weezy cried as they approached Quaker Lake. “I’ve never seen it so high.”

Neither had Jack. The lake was overflowing its banks and puddling near Quakerton Road. Mark Mulliner’s canoes sat upside down at the water’s edge. Jack doubted anyone had rented one in a while.

Mr. Rosen had been talking all week about how the ground was saturated and couldn’t hold any more water. Whatever came down had to run off somewhere, and much of it was flowing into the lake.

“It’s all the rain,” Jack said.

Eddie, switching to the world’s worst Chinese accent, bucked his teeth and said, “Yaw obvious-fu velly stlong.”

Jack had to smile. Yeah, pretty dumb thing to say. In defense, he puffed up his chest.

“That’s ‘Supreme Master of the Obvious’ to you.”

The level was higher than just yesterday when he’d crossed the bridge on his way to Old Town. Water was pooled around some of the lakeside benches and willows.

A number of his lawn-cutting customers lived in Old Town, the original settlement that had spawned the sprawling, thousand-person metropolis of Johnson, NJ. But the succession of rainy days was interfering with his schedule. Yeah, he could cut wet grass, but it always wound up looking crummy, and then he’d have to come back for a fix up.

He’d swung by after school yesterday to see if the lawns were dry enough to cut. They were, so he’d raced home to get his mower. But as soon as he wheeled it out of the garage, the skies opened up again.

No mow, no pay. And the longer the grass, the tougher the job, and the longer to get it done. A vicious cycle.

As the three of them pedaled across the bridge over the lake, Jack glanced at a boxy, two-story, stucco building known around town as “the Lodge.” It belonged to the globe-spanning Ancient Septimus Fraternal Order. A very secretive bunch, tight-lipped about its activities and purposes and membership, and highly selective about who it accepted.

It had lodges all over the world. Why they’d put one here in Johnson, New Jersey, no one knew. Well, Weezy knew – or thought she did. She said the Lodge was here before the town, that members of the Order had settled here in prehistoric times. But that was part of her Secret History of the World, and the Septimus Order played a big role in it.

Membership was by invitation only, and this Lodge was rumored to include some of the state’s most influential and powerful people.

Weezy glared at the building as they passed.

“You want to find our pyramid, look in there.”

Jack was ahead of Eddie but could hear an eye roll in his tone as he muttered, “Here we go.”

“It’s true,” she said.

Against his better judgment, Jack said, “Things do get lost, Weez. It happens all the time.”

“Things that are clues to the Secret History don’t get lost, they get hidden away. The Order’s job is to keep the Secret history secret. If we searched that place, we’d find it.”

“Fat chance,” Eddie said. “What are you gonna do, get invited in for milk and cookies?”

“I’ll think of something. And you’ll come with me, right, Jack?”

Jack glanced at the Lodge’s barred windows and figured it was safe to agree – no way they’d ever see the inside of that place.

“If you’re there, I’m there.”

They passed the empty and supposedly haunted Klenke house that had been for sale ever since Jack could remember, and then the home of the town’s supposed witch, Mrs. Clevenger. Jack had heard stories about the weird smells and noises in the Klenke place, but he’d never been in there himself, so he couldn’t say if they were true or not. He had, however, come into contact with Mrs. Clevenger on a number of occasions since the summer, and though she was strange and never gave a straight answer, she wasn’t a witch. Who believed in witches and hauntings anyway?

They approached the place where Quakerton Road ended and the Pine Barrens began. Jack recognized Gus Sooy’s pickup parked by the lightning tree. A lot of folks said Gus’s moonshine – known as applejack – was the best in the Pinelands. Jack also recognized the guy buying from him.

So did Eddie. “There’s Weird Walt,” he said from behind Jack. “Stocking up.”

“Hey,” Weezy called as she brought up the rear on her banana-seat Schwinn. “Don’t call him that.”

She and Walt had a strange bond, and she always took his side.

“It’s gotta be eighty degrees out and he’s wearing leather gloves and you’re telling me he’s not weird?”

Jack glanced over to where Walt was watching Gus Sooy fill a quart bottle with water-clear liquor from one of his big brown jugs. Hard to argue against him being weird. Folks said Walter Erskine hadn’t been right since he’d returned from Vietnam. He said weird things and wore gloves day in and day out.

“He’s a good guy,” Jack said as they turned onto a firebreak trail and followed it into the Pines.

Weezy moved up beside him. “How would you know?”

“He comes into the store every now and then and we talk. He–”

A helicopter, heading southeast, did its wup-wup-wup thing overhead and Weezy stopped for a moment to stare with an anxious expression.

Jack understood her reaction. A few weeks ago, late one August night, government men – at least Jack assumed they were from the government – had used black helicopters to fly backhoes into the Pines and dig up the mound where he and Weezy had found the pyramid and the corpse. Who had told them about the mound? Who had sent them to tear it apart? These were questions he doubted he’d ever answer.

“It’s not black,” he said. “And it’s not headed our way. Probably some high rollers headed for AC.”

Gambling had been legal in Atlantic City for half a dozen years now and was enormously popular.

Weezy said nothing as she pulled ahead to lead the way. She always rode point when they were in the woods. Made sense. She knew this corner of the Pine Barrens backward, forward, up and down. She never got lost.

As they rode, the forty-foot scrub pines thickened on either side, stretching their gnarled, green-needled branches overhead as they lined the path like sentinels guarding their woodland domain. Jack checked the overcast sky through the needled canopy. This was the kind of day when people got lost in the Pines and were never seen again. But no worry about that with Weezy along.

Weezy led them along the dipping, deeply puddled trail onto Old Man Foster’s land. Foster was something of a mystery. Nobody had ever seen him or seemed to know who he was, but he kept his land heavily posted with signs warning against fishing, hunting, trapping, and trespassing. Jack ignored them. He figured obeying the first three out of the four was good enough.

At least he wasn’t trapping like a certain someone was doing around a spong they’d be passing along the way.

When they reached the spong they saw Mrs. Clevenger standing with an armload of sticks. She wore her usual long black dress and a black scarf around her neck – which made as much sense in this weather as Walt’s gloves. Her three-legged dog sat to the side, watching their approach. The big, floppy-eared mutt had the thick body of a rottweiler but with lots of other breeds mixed in. Its right front leg was missing as if it had never been – not even a scar.

Weezy stopped and waved. “Hi, Mrs. Clevenger. Need any help?”

“No, dear. I’m doing fine.”

Some Piney had been setting leg-hold traps around the spong – the local term for a wet low spot – trying to catch coons and possums and such when they came for a drink. Mrs. Clevenger had been coming out regularly and springing the traps with sticks. Jack wondered what the trapper would do if he ever caught the old lady at it. Whatever it was, he’d have to get past her nameless dog, and that wouldn’t be easy.

Eventually they reached a burned-out area deep in the Pines. They knew the place well. Maybe too well. Here was where they’d dug up the little pyramid and the corpse.

After they'd leaned their bikes against some trees, Jack stood in the shade and pulled out their aerial photo of the area. Judging by the position of the midmorning sun, they’d been following the fire trail eastward. The mound lay to the right of the trail, which meant south. The strange-looking thing he’d spotted on the photo was to the right of the mound, which meant farther south.

He pointed to the burned-out area. “This way.”

As they walked a weaving course through the blackened tree trunks, Jack saw green branchlets poking through the charred bark. Hard to kill these pines. Fires were common in the Barrens during the summer and fall, mostly the fault of campers and lightning. With all the recent rain, he doubted they’d see any fires at all this season.

“Think anything’s left in there?” Jack said, pointing to the ruins of the mound as they passed.

Weezy shook her head. “Look at it. It’s not even a mound anymore.”

She had a point. The government men had left little more than a twisty-turny trench, now filled with stagnant water.

The pines thickened past the burned-out area, slowing their progress.

“This better be worth it,” Eddie said.

Jack had known it was only a matter of time before he’d start complaining. He was kind of surprised he’d held off this long.

“Shouldn’t be too much farther now. According to the photo, we should hit a clearing any…”

He stopped and stared as he spotted an open area dead ahead.

“…minute.”

The clearing hadn’t surprised him, but what stood in its center stopped him cold.

Weezy pushed past him, then stopped, saying “Ohmygod!” over and over.

Jack couldn’t speak. The Pines were full of secrets and surprises, but this… this was over the top. Way over.

3

“What is it?” Eddie said from behind.

“Some sort of…pyramid.”

At maybe fifteen feet tall, it had nothing height-wise on the ones in Egypt, but this was definitely a pyramid, and unlike any Jack had seen or heard of. He wondered if anyone alive today had ever laid eyes on it.

Weezy finally stopped saying, “Ohmygod!” and the three of them approached the pyramid. The closer they got, the odder it became.

As Jack neared he noticed it wasn’t solid. Huge, elongated triangular stones stood in a circle, their bases buried in the sandy soil with their pointed ends jutting skyward and leaning toward each other.

“Looks like Godzilla pizza slices,” Eddie said.

A typical Eddie comment. If he wasn’t thinking about videogames, he was thinking about food. But his comment hit the mark: the structure did resemble half a dozen giant petrified pizza slices, crusts down and arranged in a circle.

A three-foot high wall of headstonelike rectangular slabs ringed the whole thing.

They marched around it in silence. One of the triangular megaliths was broken halfway up, but the undamaged points of the remaining five met and leaned against each other at the pyramid’s apex.

“Notice, Weez? Six sides… just like our little pyramid.”

The gleaming black artifact they’d found in the mound back there would have fit inside a softball. It too had six sides – seven if you counted the base.

Weezy nodded but said nothing. She seemed in a daze, incapable of speech, or even taking her eyes off the pyramid. Jack thought he knew how she felt: She’d lost a little piece of the Secret History, but found something much bigger. He felt it too. The strangeness, the ancient, alien feel to the structure.

They came to a broken fence stone. Without a word, Weezy stepped over it and entered the circle. Jack followed but Eddie hung back.

Jack turned to look at him. “Coming?”

Eddie looked uncomfortable. “This whole place is majorly creepacious.”

Jack agreed, but he put on a smile. “Don’t worry. Weezy will protect you.”

Eddie rolled his eyes and stepped over the broken slab. “I should know better by now to go anywhere with you guys. You find dead bodies, you get me locked up in a police car and chased by the cops, but do I learn? Nooooo.”

“Look, Jack.”

Weezy was standing by one of the leaning megaliths, rubbing her hand over the surface. Her expression was triumphant, beaming vindication. He imagined this was what Percival looked like when he glimpsed the Holy Grail.

“What have you got?” he said, approaching.

“Look familiar?”

With a trembling finger she traced a circle around a faint indentation in the weather-smoothed surface of the stone. Jack squinted until he could make out the full outline, then he gasped. Recognition was like a punch in the chest.

“That’s…that was on our pyramid!”

She nodded and jumped to the next where she again ran her hands over the surface. She seemed about to explode.

“So was this one.”

Then to the next stone.

Her voice shook. “This one too.”

They were connected. No question.

“So…” he managed, swallowing hard as he stepped back for a longer look. “Is this based on our little pyramid, or was ours based on this?”

She shrugged. “Who can say? No way they’re not connected. I mean, they’re too much alike. But our pyramid wasn’t made of stone.”

Right. They’d given it to Professor Nakamura who’d had it analyzed at the University of Pennsylvania. No one there could say what it was made of, but it sure hadn’t been stone. All they’d been able to say was that it was many thousands of years old – and then it had disappeared.

Jack stepped up to one of the megaliths and felt its surface. “Granite?”

Weezy moved up next to him. “That’s what it feels like to me. Except…”

“Except what?”

“There’s no granite in the Barrens, or anywhere near here.”

Jack never understood where Weezy got all her information, but he’d learned to believe her. She wasn’t a bull slinger.

Eddie joined them, saying, “So that means somebody cut these pizza slices somewhere else, drove them all the way out here, and made a teepee out of them. What for?”

Jack was thinking that “teepee” was a pretty good description when Weezy said, “‘Drove’? I don’t think so. Can’t you see how old these are? I’ll bet they were dragged here on rollers.”

Jack looked at the stones and tried to imagine their weight, and the work it must have taken to carve each from a block of granite and then transport it here from wherever. He remembered Eddie’s last question.

“But why?”

“And look,” Eddie said. “It’s not even put together right. They left spaces between the rocks.”

“They’ve probably shifted over the ages,” Weezy said.

Jack wasn’t so sure about that. He’d noticed the spaces, but they seemed pretty uniform. Wouldn’t shifting and settling over time have resulted in uneven gaps? These all looked to be an even ten or twelve inches apart at their bases, tapering as they went up. That couldn’t have happened by chance.

He peered through one of the gaps. The empty space within was lit by strips of daylight streaming between the stones. Its floor lay about three feet below ground level under a couple of inches of rainwater. Jack could make out a layer of sandy soil beneath the surface. A stone column, maybe a foot in diameter and four feet high, stood in the exact center of the space.

Weezy and Eddie had moved up to gaps of their own on either side of him.

“It is a teepee!” Eddie cried. “Just like I said: a stone teepee!”

Weezy’s voice dripped scorn. “A teepee is a place to live, so it needs a doorway – you know, one of those handy openings you use to get in and out? Plus, it’s supposed to protect you from the weather. This flunks on both.”

“All right, Miss Know-It-All, what is it then?”

Weezy hesitated, then, “I don’t know. But maybe if I look at it from another angle…”

To Jack’s surprise, she turned sideways, squeezed through the gap, and jumped down to the inner floor. She landed with a splash. He noticed she was wearing old sneakers. He looked down at his own battered Converse All-Stars. They’d been soaked before, no reason they couldn’t get soaked again.

Jack squeezed through his gap – a tight fit but he made it – and eased himself to the floor to avoid splashing Weezy. Cool water filled his sneakers as he looked up and saw Eddie watching from outside. He made no move to join them. Jack was about to coax him in when he realized that even if Eddie wanted to join them, he couldn’t. No way he’d fit through the narrow opening. Or worse, if he forced himself in, he might not be able to get out.

Jack turned in a slow circle, uncomfortable with the trapped feeling that stole over him. He saw a triangle of cloudy sky above the damaged megalith. The broken-off apex rested at an angle against its base.

What had happened? A weakness in the stone? A lightning strike? He’d never know.

“Look,” Weezy said, pointing to the perimeter of the sunken area.

Jack saw how the sides sloped away at an angle, following the inner surfaces of the megaliths.

“How deep do you think the stones are buried?” she asked.

Jack shrugged. He had no idea, but the megaliths were even bigger than they appeared from the outside.

He heard splashing and turned to see Weezy making her way toward the short column in the center. Her speed increased until she all but leaped the last few feet.

“Jack! Look at this!”

When he joined her he found her running her hands over the top of the column.

“Look! It’s the same shape, the exact same size!”

Jack immediately saw what she meant – a six-sided indentation in the top of the column, a perfect fit for their lost little pyramid. No doubt about it now – the two pyramids were connected.

“What do you think it did here?”

“I don’t know but…” Anger washed across her features, leaving steely determination.

“But what?”

“Somehow, some way, I’m going to get our pyramid back and find out.”

Jack shared her desire but couldn’t see any way to make that happen, so he looked for a way to change the subject. He turned and pointed to the megaliths.

“Why go to all the trouble to drag these things here and set them up like this?”

Weezy shook her head. “Stonehenge was set up as a sort of solar calendar. Maybe this is something like that. Maybe the sun shines through one of these cracks and – ohmygod!”

“What?”

“Our pyramid. I’ll bet they placed it right here in the center so that at certain times of the year a shaft of sunlight hit it and…”

“And what?”

She looked at him with a lost expression. “I don’t know. But I’ve got to know. And I will know.”

But Jack was thinking about something else. He did a slow turn, taking in the placement of the megaliths, the spaces between, the way they were tilted inward, making them virtually impossible to climb…

He felt a little squeeze in his chest as it all came together.

“I don’t know about sunbeams and that sort of stuff, but look around. Imagine you’re a tiger or a lion… those openings are wide enough to toss food inside but too narrow for something big to squeeze through. I think this is some sort of cage.”

The story continues here… Jack: Secret Circles

1984

JACK: SECRET VENGEANCE

The concluding volume of the Teen Trilogy. Jack meets Glaeken for the first time, but thinks he’s just a strange old dude who happens to know Mrs. Clevenger.

This is where you see Jack developing his knack for solving problems from the shadows. All sorts of bad stuff befalls the folks who deserve it, but it seems like bad luck. Or if it looks like they’ve been set up, they have no idea who was behind it.

Readers want to know more about Jack than I’m willing to tell. His last name, for instance. Truth is, even I don’t know his last name because I’ve never given him one. They also ask about his childhood – what sort of upbringing did he have? (The child being father to the man, and all that.) That was another reason I started the trilogy.

What surprised me most was how much fun I was having with these books. I delighted in peeking into Jack's past and populating it with people who would play parts in his later life, or arranging cameos of characters from other novels. (Longtime readers of the series were delighted with a cameo by one of their fave characters.) I also made sure that the teen books fed into the larger story being played out in the adult series.

The books practically wrote themselves. Like taking dictation.

At its heart the trilogy is all about friendship and self-discovery and the secrets that hide behind the façade of everyday life.

Book three starts on an ominous note…

JACK: SECRET VENGEANCE

(sample)

SUNDAY

Weezy was attacked on a Saturday night

1

“Jack,” his mother called from down the hall. “Weezy’s on the phone.”

Jack poked his head out from under the covers, forced his eyes open, and checked the clock on the table next to his bed. He saw 8:13 in glowing red numbers. He squinted at his window. A cloudy morning sky peeked around the edge of the drawn shade.

“I’ll call her back.”

“She says it’s important.”

What could be important at eight thirty on a Sunday morning?

Groaning, he slid out of bed, pulled on his jeans, and padded barefoot down the hall past his brother’s and sister’s empty bedrooms. Tom was finishing law school in Jersey City and Kate had started med school in Stratford. He veered right, into the kitchen where his mother was cracking eggs, and picked up the receiver lying on the counter.

“Hey.”

“Jack, I need to talk to you. Real bad.”

“Well, hello, stranger.”

Except for brief conversations at the school bus stop, they hadn’t seen too much of each other lately.

“I’m serious, Jack. I really need to talk.”

Something in her voice… he couldn't put his finger on it, but he sensed she was upset. She didn't get along too well with her folks, especially her dad. Weezy was a little too strange for him. Maybe a lot too strange.

Not too strange for Jack. She was just… Weezy.

Maybe they'd had a blowup.

“Okay. Want to come over for breakfast?”

“No. I don't want anyone else listening in. Meet me on the bridge and we'll bike into the Barrens where no one can hear us.”

Weezy…always mysterious. Well, he had some time before he was due for work at USED.

“Sure. Let me get something to eat and I’ll meet you there in half an hour.”

“That long?”

“I’m hungry, Weez. I’ll try for twenty.”

“Okay.”

He smiled as he hung up. Now what? Never a dull moment with Weezy Connell. And Jack wouldn't have it any other way.

He heard voices coming from the living room – first a man’s, then a woman’s. Radio? TV? His folks never played either on Sunday morning. This was newspaper time. If they played anything, it was one of Mom’s Broadway soundtracks. He went to check and found his father seated before the TV, leaning forward, eyes glued to the screen.

And on that screen – a pile of burning, smoking rubble with fire trucks and ambulances milling around. A caption said Beirut, Lebanon. The little CNN logo sat in the lower right corner.

“What happened?”

Dad looked up, his expression grim. “See that pile of concrete? That was a four-story Marine barrack until some crazy Arabs blew it up.”

Jack stared at the rubble. Four stories? It was barely one now.

“An air raid?”

“No. Word coming out is some nut case drove a truckload of explosives through the front door and blew it up.”

Jack blinked. “With himself still in it?”

“Yeah. What they’re calling a ‘suicide bombing.’ Same thing happened to a French barracks a few miles away. They think the dead count is going to reach three hundred.”

Jack was aghast.

“Are they crazy? I mean, blowing themselves up?”

“Well, the kamikaze pilots during World War Two went on suicide missions, but that was in battle, during a war. These kids were all part of a peacekeeping force.”

“But…why?” He couldn’t fathom anyone doing this.

“Who knows? Some reporter said it was like Pearl Harbor – a sneak attack at dawn on a Sunday morning. But the Japs had the decency to declare war first. And they had a country and an army and a navy we could strike back at. Some group called Islamic Jihad is taking credit for this. Who the hell are they? No one seems to know a thing about them, except they also claimed credit for that US Embassy bomb back in April.”

Jack had heard about that but had been only peripherally aware of it. This seemed different, and was so much worse. He could tell from his father’s expression and tone that he was steamed.

He remembered the Iran hostage crisis of a few years ago, now these suicide bombings. What was going on in the Middle East? Had they all gone insane?

Mom coaxed Dad away from the tube with a promise of sausage and eggs. An almost funereal breakfast followed, the silence broken only by Mom’s futile attempts at conversation and Dad’s muttered remarks about the “inexcusable lack of security” at the barracks.

Jack couldn’t remember ever seeing his father like this. He was a Korean War vet who never had anything good to say about the army. He’d always made it very clear that he didn’t want either of his sons anywhere near the armed services. But he seemed deeply shaken by the deaths of so many US soldiers. Maybe he made a distinction between servicemen and the armed services. Maybe some automatic brotherhood sprouted between guys who had been to war. Like at the local VFW post.

After breakfast he went right back to the TV, and Jack headed for his bike.

2

He beat her to the Old Town bridge, a narrow, one-lane wooden span over Quaker Lake, which wasn't really a lake, just a good-size pond. It finally had returned to its normal level after all the rains last month.

He sat on his BMX and wiped an arm across his sweaty forehead. A hot day, despite the clouds, and despite it being late October. The 1983 Farmer’s Almanac had predicted a cool fall for the area. In Jack’s experience that meant keep the swimming trunks handy.

He looked around at the place where he’d spent all his fourteen years: Johnson, New Jersey, a small town in Burlington County. It began on the west side of Route 206 and ended where it abutted the western edge of the Jersey Pine Barrens. Nobody knew exactly when the town was settled, but it had changed its name from Quakertown to Johnson after President Andrew Johnson spent the night here sometime in the 1860s.

He saw Weezy round the corner off North Franklin and roll his way along Quakerton Road on her banana-seat Schwinn. Louise “Weezy” Connell was probably the best of the few friends Jack had, but he hadn't seen much of her in the weeks since the Cody Bockman fiasco. Though only four months older – she’d just turned fifteen, while he’d have to wait till January – she was a full year ahead of him in school. He was a lowly frosh, while she was an experienced sophomore.

She wore – surprise! – black jeans, a black T-shirt, and black sneakers. Her dark, shoulder-length hair was pulled into a ponytail that swung back and forth as she pedaled.

When she got close enough to see her face, he knew something was wrong. First off, no eye liner – the only makeup she ever wore. This was the first time in the past year he could remember seeing her without it. Her expression was strange.

“You okay?” he said when she reached him.

“No.” She rolled past onto the bridge. “Talk to you in the woods.”

He followed her into Old Town, the original settlement, which Weezy said was much, much older than anyone thought, part of what she called the Secret History of the World. They passed the boxy structure of the Septimus Lodge and skirted the filled-in sink holes from last month’s underground flood. A dozen or better pocked the pavement and some of the yards.

As they neared the end of Quakerton Road, where Old Town petered out and the pines began, Jack spotted Lester Appleton’s pickup, parked in its usual spot next to the Lightning Tree. That was the applejack spot. Depending on the day of the week, you could find either Lester or Gus Sooy there, ready to sell their moonshine. A couple of men stood by the tailgate, watching as Lester filled their whiskey bottles from a large ceramic jug.

The Appletons were an old piney family, supposedly inbred. If anyone had a doubt about that, one look at Lester was pretty convincing. Skinny, with his left eye always pointed toward his nose and tufts of wild-looking hair shooting off his scalp in all directions, he wore overalls worn through at the knees, and sneakers with no socks. His hands and his ankles were gray with grime. His back was bent and twisted, which made him lean forward and to the right. He kept licking his lips with a big red tongue.

Some people said he made the best applejack in the Pines – a secret he learned from his father, Jacob – while others preferred Gus Sooy’s. All strictly illegal, but nobody complained. Applejack was a part of life in and around the Pine Barrens.

“Where we headed?” Jack called as he followed Weezy onto one of the firebreak trails that cut through the trees.

“You'll see,” she said without turning.

No matter how many times he entered the Barrens – and he'd been doing it most of his life – Jack never failed to feel a little uneasy as the gnarled, forty-foot scrub pines leaned their scraggly branches over the path as if looking for a chance to grab him. The place seemed alive.

“Want to talk now?”

“When we get there.”

They moved deeper into the Barrens, the million or so acres of woods smack in the center of the state that hid places no human had ever seen. Every year a few people walked in and never came out.

The familiar No Fishing / No Hunting / No Trapping / No Trespassing signs tacked up everywhere were a sure sign they were on Old Man Foster’s land. They passed the spong where a cantankerous piney kept putting out leg-hold traps and Mrs. Clevenger kept springing them. Looked like she’d been here recently because all the traps had sticks stuck in their sprung jaws.

Weezy led him deeper into Foster’s land until she turned off the trail onto a path that consisted of two ruts with a grassy ridge between. Jack had never been this way but Weezy probably had. She loved to explore the Barrens.

Finally she came to a stop near a small open area where a sturdy old oak stood tall and wide among the more spindly pines.

She turned to Jack and said, “This is where it happened.”

He looked around. “Where what happened?”

Her face screwed up and her eyes filled with tears. “Where Carson attacked me!”

Before Jack knew it, he was off his bike and in her face.

“He what? Carson Toliver attacked you?”

Suddenly Weezy's arms were around him and her face was pressed against his chest.

“Yes! I thought he was going to… you know!”

As she sobbed against him, Jack raised his arms, unsure of what to do with them. Finally he slipped them around Weezy's back and gently held her. He tried to think of something to say but came up blank. All he could think of was murder.

Carson Toliver, a big, studly senior, the captain and quarterback of the Burlington Badgers, and the heartthrob of South Burlington County Regional High. When he'd first shown some interest in Weezy during the summer, her IQ had immediately lost eighty points. Jack had assumed it was because of her notoriety as co-discoverer of a ritually mutilated corpse in the Barrens. He’d seen him sniffing around a few times since then, but hadn't seen any signs that it had progressed beyond that.

Apparently it had.

Weezy sobbed a couple more times then pushed away, head down as she wiped her eyes.

“Sorry. I guess I’ve been holding it in too long.”

“Have you told your folks?”

Her head snapped up and he saw a wild, frightened look in her eyes. “No! No way! And you can't say anything! They don't even know I was out with him! They think I was at your house!”

“Swell.” He remained baffled. “What… how…?”

“He asked me to go out with him. Said it was so cool, you know, about the body we found, and about Cody, and he wanted to hear all about it.”

Jack made a face. “And your brain turned into a big Gummy Bear.”

She looked offended. “Did not.”

“I've seen it happen before.”

“Well, okay, when the hottest guy in school is interested in you… you wouldn’t understand.”

“Got that right.”

“Anyway, I told him my folks would never let me go out with a senior, especially a guy with a car.”

Toliver’s car…a cool Mustang GLX convertible. Jack wouldn’t mind a ride in that himself.

“So he told you not to tell them.”

She cocked her head. “How did you know?”

“Lucky guess.”

“So anyway, last night I walked over to Old Town and he picked me up and drove us into the Pines.”

“Weren’t you a little worried about that?”

She frowned. “Looking back, yeah, I should have been, but we were talking about the body and how it had been mutilated and about Cody and about how mysterious the Pines are and he said he’d found a cool place he didn’t think anyone else knew about and would I like to see it and of course I said yes.”

“Of course.”

Telling Weezy about a cool new place in the Pines was like dangling a wriggling goldfish before a cat.

“So we stopped here and instead of showing me anything, suddenly he’s grabbing me.” She blinked. “I told him to stop but he wouldn’t. His hands were all over me and I kept pushing him away but he kept on. He even tried to unbutton my blouse. Finally I hit him and he lost it. He started screaming and cursing about how ‘you goth chicks are always easy’ and I got so scared I jumped out of the car. But even that didn’t stop him. He came after me and grabbed me and ripped my blouse but I got away and ran.”

“You outran Carson Toliver?” The guy was an ace athlete.

“I got into the trees and hid. He couldn’t find me, so he just stood there and screamed. Maybe because he’s who he is and lots of girls are easy with him he expected me to be too, but he was…” She raised trembling hands to her face. “Jack, I was so scared. It was like he’d gone insane. Finally he left.”

“He left you to walk home?” The urge to kill rose again. “You’ve got to report him.”

“I can’t! I just want it to go away.”

“He attacked you. That’s assault or battery or both. That’s a crime. You should tell the cops.”

“Ohmygod, no! If I report it I’ll be in trouble with my folks and he can just say I’m crazy and that we were never together and I can’t prove that we were and everyone will side with him because he’s popular and I’m a nobody, and besides, who’ll believe he’d ask me out anyway, and I’m already known as a weirdo, so just think of what they’ll be saying about me if I say he attacked me.”

When she stopped for air, Jack jumped in.

“So…you want me to do something?”

She looked at him as if he’d just spoken Swahili. “Do something? No. And anyway, what can you do?”

He had a flash vision of himself as some kind of Galahad defending Weezy’s honor by challenging Toliver to a fight… and being stomped into the dirt.

Jack wasn’t following. “Then why are you telling me all this if you don’t want my help?”

Why else would you tell someone a problem?

“I had to tell someone. I couldn’t tell my folks, and not Eddie of all people. And the girls at school – forget them. You’re the only one I can trust. And just being able to tell someone helps, don’t you see?”

Jack didn’t, but that didn’t matter. You’re the only one I can trust rang through his head, leaving a warm echo.

“So you’re just going to give him a pass?”

“I’m just going to keep my distance and pretend this never happened.”

“Tell the cops, Weez.”

“No way! I’ll just make things worse for myself. It’s over and done. I’m okay. And I’ve learned something.”

“About what?”

“About getting into a car with a guy I don’t know all that well.” She took a deep breath and looked around. “There. I feel better already.”

“Weez, a few minutes ago you were crying.”

“That’s because it was all bottled up. Now that I’ve let it out”–she gave him a weak smile and a pointed look–”now that I’ve told someone, I feel a hundred percent better.”

Still baffled, Jack shook his head. “You’re crazy.”

Her wavering smile faded. “Don’t call me that, Jack. Please. Not you.”

Her intensity took him aback. She was awful sensitive about the word.

“Okay. Sure.” He smiled. “How about ‘goth chick’? Can I call you that?”

She batted him on the arm. “I’m not goth!”

“No? Let’s see…you dress in black and you love Bauhaus and Siouxsie. Like my father likes to say–”

“Please don’t!” She jammed her fingers in her ears and began making nonsense noises that sounded like “Bobbitta-bobbitta-bobbitta.”

“–‘If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, odds are it’s a duck.’ ”

She removed her fingers from her ears. “Finished?”

“Yeah.”

“Good. Those are simply my choices. They don’t mean I’ve joined a club. I don’t like labels.”

Neither did Jack, so he dropped it.

3

They’d walked their bikes back to the firebreak trail and were readying to head back to Johnson when Weezy held up a hand.

“You know, I’ve never been through this area.”

Jack smiled. “You mean there’s someplace on Old Man Foster’s land you haven’t seen?”

She shrugged. “He owns a lot of land. Let’s take a look around.”

He looked at his watch. “We should be heading back. I’ve got to get to USED–”

“Come on, Jack. Just a little. I’d go myself but…”

Jack knew what she didn’t want to say: After last night, she didn’t want to be alone in there.

“Okay. Just a few…”

But she was already walking her bike back up the path. He brought up the rear until she stopped and pointed.

“Looks like some sort of clearing over there.”

He followed her through a line of trees and, sure enough, a clearing.

A creepy clearing…almost perfectly square, the size of half a football field, with nothing growing in it.

Nothing at all.

“What’s the story here?” Jack said, inspecting the sandy soil. “Does somebody come by and weed this place? Or spray weed killer?”

“Weed killer would leave dead plants.”

Jack looked again. She was right: no sign of vegetation, living or dead.

“Check this out,” she said, kneeling to examine a bright green fern along the edge. She stretched one of the fronds and gave it a close look, then muttered something that sounded like “warts.”

“What?”

“Ebony spleenwort. It doesn’t usually grow in the Barrens because the soil’s too acid.”

Jack felt his eyes roll of their own accord. “How do you know this stuff? And why?”

She rose and faced him. “Because the Pines have lots of lost towns – villages and such that just up and disappeared.”

“Or were built over, as we well know.”

She nodded. “But one way to spot where a town once stood is ebony spleenwort. Pinelands soil is acidic and ebony spleenwort doesn’t like acid. So it grows over buried foundations because the old limestone and mortar reduce the acidity in the soil over them.” She gestured around. “We’re standing in an old foundation.”

Jack looked at the big square of naked soil. “Of what?”

Weezy stepped onto the bare earth and wandered toward the center of the square. Jack followed, scuffing the ground as he followed. Not a sign of life. Not a beetle, not a wormhole, not a single ant hill. Looked like nothing had ever grown here. Something else seemed to be missing from the soft soil but he couldn’t say what.

Weezy stopped and turned in a slow circle, pointing. “See? The spleenwort runs all around the edges. A building once stood here – a big one.”

“Big is right. What was this place? And why won’t anything grow in the center? It’s like it’s some sort of dead zone.”

“Dead zone…” She looked at him. “Why does that sound familiar?”

“It’s a movie coming out.” Jack had seen a preview when he’d gone to see the animated Fire and Ice. “I think it’s about–”

“Shhhh!” Weezy said, pointing.

Jack looked and saw a pair of young Pineland deer walking their way. He froze and watched as they approached the clearing. It looked as if they were going to step into it when both abruptly turned right and followed the spleenwort to the corner, then turned left and followed the far edge. At the next corner they made another left until they came even with their path on the far side, then turned away. Jack watched their white tails disappear into the trees.

“Did you see that?” Weezy said, her voice hushed.

Or course he’d seen it. And now he knew what else was missing from the bare square.

“Tracks.”

Weezy stared at him. “What?”

“Look.” He pointed to the ground around them. “It hasn’t rained for at least a week but the only tracks here are our footprints. The only explanation for that has to be that animals won’t cross this space. It’s really and truly a dead zone. What’s going on here?”

“Or maybe, what went on here. I don’t know, but… it doesn’t feel right.”

Jack knew exactly what she meant.

She gave him a sickly look. “I don’t think I want to be here anymore.”

Neither did he, but he put on a carefree expression. “Whatever. I’ve got to go to work anyway.” He looked around. “You think this place might be part of your Secret History of the World?”

She nodded. “Definitely. But maybe some things should remain secret. Let’s get out of here.”

Jack didn’t argue. If nothing else, the dead zone seemed to have chased Carson Toliver from her thoughts.

But not from Jack’s.

The rest awaits you here… Jack: Secret Vengeance

1988

“Faces”

…is set in Reborn’s Village of Monroe and referred to later in Conspiracies. But "Faces" has an even closer link to the Secret History. You see, Carly was conceived just about the same time Carol Stevens conceived her child in Reborn. Rasalom’s reincarnation had a ripple effect through the embryos gestating within a certain range.

In 1987 I needed a 10,000-word story to fulfill a commitment to an anthology called Night Visions VI. I'd been perking a story about a serial killer (this was before The Silence of the Lambs and the serial killer glut) but one with a difference. This one would be female (they're almost always male), hideously deformed, and sympathetic. I felt if I could tell you about the forces driving Carly to these murderous acts – her childhood, her needs, her emotional hungers – you might understand her. You might even find some sort of love for her.

“Faces” is one of my most reprinted short stories – made a best-of-the-year anthology and even got the graphic treatment in IDW’s short-lived Doomed. It has its share of horror, but it’s emotionally wrenching as well – how even good people can be cruel to those who are too much unlike us.

Years later I happened to reread Richard Matheson's "Born of Man and Woman" and realized what a significant – though unconscious – influence it had on my story. I believe Carly is Matheson's little girl all grown up.

One of my most reprinted short stories – made a best-of-the-year anthology and even got the graphic treatment in IDW’s short-lived Doomed. It has its share of horror, but it’s emotionally wrenching as well – how even good people can be cruel to those who are too much unlike us.

Here’s how it begins…

“Faces”

(sample)

Bite her face off.

No pain. Her dead already. Kill her quick like others. Not want make pain. Not her fault.

The boyfriend groan but not move. Face way on ground now. Got from behind. Got quick. Never see. He can live.

Girl look me after the boyfriend go down. Gasp first. When see face start scream. Two claws not cut short rip her throat before sound get loud.

Her sick-scared look just like all others. Hate that look. Hate it terrible.

Sorry, girl. Not your fault.

Chew her face skin. Chew all. Chew hard and swallow. Warm wet redness make sickish but chew and chew. Must eat face. Must get all down. Keep down.

Leave the eyes.

The boyfriend groan again. Move arm. Must leave quick. Take last look blood and teeth and stare-eyes that once pretty girlface.

Sorry, girl. Not your fault.

Got go. Get way hurry. First take money. Girl money. Take the boyfriend wallet, also too. Always take money. Need money.

Go now. Not too far. Climb wall of near building. Find dark spot where can see and not be seen. Where can wait. Soon the Detective Harrison arrive.

In downbelow can see the boyfriend roll over. Get to knees. Sway. See him look the girlfriend.

The boyfriend scream terrible. Bad to hear. Make so sad. Make cry.

*

Kevin Harrison heard Jacobi's voice on the other end of the line and wanted to be sick.

"Don't say it," he groaned.

"Sorry," said Jacobi. "It's another one."

"Where?"

"West Forty-ninth, right near–"

"I'll find it." All he had to do was look for the flashing red lights. "I'm on my way. Shouldn't take me too long to get in from Monroe at this hour."

"We've got all night, lieutenant." Unsaid, but well understood, was an admonishing, You're the one who wants to live on Long Island.

Beside him in the bed, Martha spoke from deep in her pillow as he hung up.

"Not another one?"

"Yeah."

"Oh, God! When is it going to stop?"

"When I catch the guy."

Her hand touched his arm, gently. "I know all this responsibility's not easy. I'm here when you need me."

"I know." He leaned over and kissed her. "Thanks."

He left the warm bed and skipped the shower. No time for that. A fresh shirt, yesterday's rumpled suit, a tie shoved into his pocket, and he was off into the winter night.

With his secure little ranch house falling away behind him, Harrison felt naked and vulnerable out here in the dark. As he headed south on Glen Cove Road toward the LIE, he realized that Martha and the kids were all that were holding him together these days. His family had become an island of sanity and stability in a world gone mad.

Everything else was in flux. For reasons he still could not comprehend, he had volunteered to head up the search for this killer. Now his whole future in the department had come to hinge on his success in finding him.

The papers had named the maniac "the Facelift Killer." As apt a name as the tabloids could want, but Harrison resented it. The moniker was callous, trivializing the mutilations perpetrated on the victims. But it had caught on with the public and they were stuck with it, especially with all the ink the story was getting.

Six killings, one a week for six weeks in a row, and eight million people in a panic. Then, for almost two weeks, the city had gone without a new slaying.

Until tonight.

Harrison's stomach pitched and rolled at the thought of having to look at one of those faceless corpses again.

*

"That's enough," Harrison said, averting his eyes from the faceless corpse.

The raw, gouged, bloody flesh, the exposed muscle and bone were bad enough, but it was the eyes – those naked, lidless, staring eyes were the worst.

"This makes seven," Jacobi said at his side. Squat, dark, jowly, the sergeant was chewing a big wad of gum, noisily, aggressively, as if he had a grudge against it.

"I can count. Anything new?"

"Nah. Same M.O. as ever – throat slashed, money stolen, face gnawed off."

Harrison shuddered. He had come in as Special Investigator after the third Facelift killing. He had inspected the first three via coroner's photos. Those had been awful. But nothing could match the effect of the real thing up close and still warm and oozing. This was the fourth fresh victim he had seen. There was no getting used to this kind of mutilation, no matter how many he saw. Jacobi put on a good show, but Harrison sensed the revulsion under the sergeant's armor.

And yet...

Beneath all the horror, Harrison sensed something. There was anger here, sick anger and hatred of spectacular proportions. But beyond that, something else, an indefinable something that had drawn him to this case. Whatever it was, that something called to him, and still held him captive.

If he could identify it, maybe he could solve this case and wrap it up. And save his ass.

If he did solve it, it would be all on his own. Because he wasn't getting much help from Jacobi, and even less from his assigned staff. He knew what they all thought – that he had taken the job as a glory grab, a shortcut to the top. Sure, they wanted to see this thing wrapped up, too, but they weren't shedding any tears over the shit he was taking in the press and on TV and from City Hall.

Their attitude was clear: If you want the spotlight, Harrison, you gotta take the heat that goes with it.

They were right, of course. He could have been working on a quieter case, like where all the winos were disappearing to. He'd chosen this instead. But he wasn't after the spotlight, dammit! It was this case – something about this case!

He suddenly realized that there was no one around him. The body had been carted off, Jacobi had wandered back to his car. He had been left standing alone at the far end of the alley.

And yet not alone.

Someone was watching him. He could feel it. The realization sent a little chill – one completely unrelated to the cold February wind – trickling down his back. A quick glance around showed no one paying him the slightest bit of attention. He looked up.

There!

Somewhere in the darkness above, someone was watching him. Probably from the roof. He could sense the piercing scrutiny and it made him a little weak. That was no ghoulish neighborhood voyeur, up there. That was the Facelift Killer.

He had to get to Jacobi, have him seal off the building. But he couldn't act spooked. He had to act calm, casual.

*

See the Detective Harrison's eyes. See from way up in dark. Tall-thin. Hair brown. Nice eyes. Soft brown eyes. Not hard like many-many eyes. Look here. Even from here see eyes make wide. Him know it me.

Watch the Detective Harrison turn slow. Walk slow. Tell inside him want to run. Must leave here. Leave quick.

Bend low. Run cross roof. Jump to next. And next. Again til most block away. Then down wall. Wrap scarf round head. Hide bad-face. Hunch inside big-big coat. Walk through lighted spots.

Hate light. Hate crowds. Theatres here. Movies and plays. Like them. Some night sneak in and see. See one with man in mask. Hang from wall behind big drapes. Make cry.

Wish there mask for me.

Follow street long way to river. See many light across river. Far past there is place where grew. Never want go back to there. Never.

Catch back of truck. Ride home.

Home. Bright bulb hang ceiling. Not care. The Old Jessi waiting. The Jessi friend. Only friend. The Jessi's eyes not see. Ever. When the Jessi look me, her face not wear sick-scared look. Hate that look.

Come in kitchen window. The Jessi's face wrinkle-black. Smile when hear me come. TV on. Always on. The Jessi can not watch. Say it company for her.

"You're so late tonight."

"Hard work. Get moneys tonight."

Feel sick. Want cry. Hate kill. Wish stop.

"That's nice. Are you going to put it in the drawer?"

"Doing now."

Empty wallets. Put moneys in slots. Ones first slot. Fives next slot. Then tens and twenties. So the Jessi can pay when boy bring foods. Sometimes eat stealed foods. Mostly the Jessi call for foods.

The Old Jessi hardly walk. Good. Do not want her go out. Bad peoples round here. Many. Hurt one who not see. One bad man try hurt Jessi once. Push through door. Thought only the blind Old Jessi live here.

Lucky the Jessi not along that day.

Not lucky bad man. Hit the Jessi. Laugh hard. Then look me. Get sick-scared look. Hate that look. Kill him quick. Put in tub. Bleed there. Bad man friend come soon after. Kill him also too. Late at night take both dead bad men out. Go through window. Carry down wall. Throw in river.

No bad men come again. Ever.

"I've been waiting all night for my bath. Do you think you can help me a little?"

Always help. But the Old Jessi always ask. The Jessi very polite.

Sponge the Old Jessi back in tub. Rinse her hair. Think of the Detective Harrison. His kind eyes. Must talk him. Want stop this. Stop now. Maybe will understand. Will. Can feel

*

Seven grisly murders in eight weeks.

Kevin Harrison studied a photo of the latest victim, taken before she was mutilated. A nice eight by ten glossy furnished by her agent. A real beauty. A dancer with Broadway dreams.

He tossed the photo aside and pulled the stack of files toward him. The remnants of six lives in this pile. Somewhere within had to be an answer, the thread that linked each of them to the Facelift Killer.

But what if there was no common link? What if were all the killings were at random, linked only by the fact that they were beautiful? Seven deaths, all over the city. All with their faces gnawed off. Gnawed.

He flipped through the victims one by one and studied their photos. He had begun to feel he knew each one of them personally:

Mary Detrick, 20, a junior at N.Y.U., killed in Washington Square Park on January 5. She was the first.

Mia Chandler, 25, a secretary at Merrill Lynch, killed January 13 in Battery Park.

Ellen Beasley, 22, a photographer's assistant, killed in an alley in Chelsea on January 22.

Hazel Hauge, 30, artist agent, killed in her Soho loft on January 27.

Elisabeth Paine, 28, housewife, killed on February 2 while jogging late in Central Park.

Joan Perrin, 25, a model from Brooklyn, pulled from her car while stopped at a light on the Upper East Side on February 8.

He picked up the eight by ten again. And the last: Liza Lee, 21. Dancer. Lived across the river in Jersey City. Ducked into an alley for a toot with her boyfriend tonight and never came out.

Three blondes, three brunettes, one redhead. Some stacked, some on the flat side. All caucs except for Perrin. All lookers. But besides that, how in the world could these women be linked? They came from all over town, and they met their respective ends all over town. What could–

"Well, you sure hit the bull’s eye about that roof!" Jacobi said as he burst into the office.

Harrison straightened in his chair. "What you find?"

"Blood."

"Whose?"

"The victim's."

"No prints? No hairs? No fibers?"

"We're working on it. But how'd you figure to check the roof top?"

"Lucky guess."

Harrison didn't want to provide Jacobi with more grist for the departmental gossip mill by mentioning his feeling of being watched from up there.

But the killer had been watching, hadn't he?

"Any prelims from pathology?"

Jacobi shrugged and stuffed three sticks of gum into his mouth. Then he tried to talk.

"Same as ever. Money gone, throat ripped open by a pair of sharp pointed instruments, not knives, the bite marks on the face are the usual: the teeth that made them aren't human, but the saliva is."

The "non-human" teeth part – more teeth, bigger and sharper teeth that found in any human mouth – had baffled them all from the start. Early on someone remembered a horror novel or movie where the killer used some weird sort of false teeth to bite his victims. That had sent them off on a wild goose chase to all the dental labs looking for records of bizarre bite prostheses. No dice. No one had seen or even heard of teeth that could gnaw off a person's face.

Harrison shuddered. What could explain wounds like that? What were they dealing with here?

The irritating pops, snaps, and cracks of Jacobi's gum filled the office.

"I liked you better when you smoked."

Jacobi's reply was cut off by the phone. The sergeant picked it up.

"Detective Harrison's office!" he said, listened a moment, then, with his hand over the mouthpiece, passed the receiver to Harrison. "Some fairy wantsh to shpeak to you," he said with an evil grin.

"Fairy?"

"Hey," he said, getting up and walking toward the door. "I don't mind. I'm a liberal kinda guy, y'know?"

Harrison shook his head with disgust. Jacobi was getting less likable every day.

"Hello. Harrison here."

"Shorry dishturb you, Detective Harrishon."

The voice was soft, pitched somewhere between a man's and a woman's, and sounded as if the speaker had half a mouthful of saliva. Harrison had never heard anything like it. Who could be–?

And then it struck him: It was three a.m. Only a handful of people knew he was here.

"Do I know you?"

"No. Watch you tonight. You almosht shee me in dark."

That same chill from earlier tonight ran down Harrison's back again.

"Are…are you who I think you are?"

There was a pause, then one soft word, more sobbed than spoken:

"Yesh."

If the reply had been cocky – something along the line of And just who do you think I am? – Harrison would have looked for much more in the way of corroboration. But that single word, and the soul deep heartbreak that propelled it, banished all doubt.

My God! He looked around frantically. No one in sight. Where the fuck was Jacobi now when he needed him? This was the Facelift Killer! He needed a trace!

Got to keep him on the line!

"I have to ask you something to be sure you are who you say you are."

"Yesh?"

"Do you take anything from the victims – I mean, besides their faces?"

"Money. Take money."

This is him! The department had withheld the money part from the papers. Only the real Facelift Killer could know!

"Can I ask you something else?"

"Yesh."

Harrison was asking this one for himself.

"What do you do with the faces?"

He had to know. The question drove him crazy at night. He dreamed about those faces. Did the killer tack them on the wall, or press them in a book, or freeze them, or did he wear them around the house like that Leatherface character from that chainsaw movie?

On the other end of the line he sensed sudden agitation and panic: "No! Can not shay! Can not!"

"Okay, okay. Take it easy."

"You will help shtop?"

"Oh, yes! Oh, God, yes, I'll help you stop!" He prayed his genuine heartfelt desire to end this was coming through. "I'll help you any way I can!"

A long pause, then:

"You hate? Hate me?"

Harrison didn't trust himself to answer that right away. He searched his feelings quickly, but carefully.

"No," he said finally. "I think you have done some awful, horrible things but, strangely enough, I don't hate you."

And that was true. Why didn't he hate this murdering maniac? Oh, he wanted to stop him more than anything in the world, and wouldn't hesitate to shoot him dead if the situation required it, but there was no personal hatred for the Facelift Killer.

What is it in you that speaks to me? he wondered.

"Shank you," said the voice, couched once more in a sob.

And then the killer hung up.

Harrison shouted into the dead phone, banged it on his desk, but the line was dead.

"What the hell's the matter with you?" Jacobi said from the office door.

"That so-called 'fairy' on the phone was the Facelift Killer, you idiot! We could have had a trace if you'd stuck around!"

"Bullshit!"

"He knew about taking the money!"

"So why'd he talk like that? That's a dumb-ass way to try to disguise your voice."

And then it suddenly hit Harrison like a sucker punch to the gut. He swallowed hard and said:

"Jacobi, how do you think your voice would sound if you had a mouth crammed full of teeth much larger and sharper than the kind found in the typical human mouth?"

Harrison took genuine pleasure in the way Jacobi's face blanched slowly to yellow-white.

You’ll find the rest of “Faces” (along with many other stories)… The Barrens and Others

1990

COLD CITY

The first book in the Early Years Trilogy. Rasalom is laying low, gathering power. Jack is drawn to the city that will be the epicenter of the Ally-Otherness Ragnarok. It’s the same city where Ernst Drexler II and the Order are at work sowing chaos for the One.

After capping off the Secret History with the collision of the Adversary Cycle and the Repairman Jack saga in the revised Nightworld, I thought that would be it for Jack. But his fans deluged me with requests for more. Since I refuse to go past Nightworld, I agreed to do three prequels since in early 90s Manhattan when Jack first arrives in the city.

NYC was a different place then. The Disneyfication of Times Square was still years away. A national recession was on, the crime rate was high, and 42nd Street was still Grindhouse Row.

And Jack…he’s just 21, his mother was murdered earlier in the year, he’s dropped out of college, and he has one helluva chip on his shoulder. He doesn’t know the ropes yet – hell, he didn’t even know where to find the ropes. But he’s a quick learner, adaptable, and choosy about who he’ll call a friend. In other words, a natural-born survivor.

This Publisher’s Weekly review provides a quick synopsis with no spoilers:

“In Wilson’s lively first in a projected trilogy of prequels to his Repairman Jack saga, Jack, newly arrived in Manhattan, begins honing the skills that will eventually make him a formidable urban mercenary who operates off the grid. Jack’s talent for finding trouble is already well developed, as becomes clear when his job smuggling cigarettes runs him afoul of Arab jihadists, the mob, and a ring of sex slavers. Wilson expertly evokes Manhattan in all its gritty glory in the early ’90s and introduces series regulars Abe Grossman, Jack’s gunrunner and surrogate father, and Julio, the hard-working barkeep at Jack’s preferred watering hole, the Spot… packs a wallop that whets the appetite for his next early adventure.”

Here are some opening scenes:

COLD CITY

(sample)

THURSDAY

1

Jack might have reacted differently if he’d seen the punch coming. He might have been able to hold back a little. But he was caught off guard, and what followed shocked everyone. Jack most of all.

No surprise where it came from. Rico had been riding him since the summer, and pushing especially hard today.

The morning had started as usual. Giovanni Pastorelli, boss and owner of Two Paisanos Landscaping, had picked him up at a pre-designated subway stop in Brooklyn – Jack lived in Manhattan and trained out – and then picked up the four Dominicans who made up the rest of the crew. The Dominicans all lived together in a crowded apartment in Bushwick but Giovanni refused to drive through there. He made the “wetbacks” – his not unaffectionate term for them when they weren’t around – train to a safer neighborhood.

Jack had arrived in the city in June and came across the Two Paisanos boss in July at a nursery. His landscaping business had started with two paisanos but now had only one, Giovanni, who almost laughed Jack off when he’d asked if he needed an extra hand. He was a twenty-one-year old who looked younger. But he’d worked with a number of landscapers in high school and college, and ten minutes of talk convinced the boss he’d be taking on experienced help.

But Jack’s knowledge of Spanish, rudimentary though it was, clinched the hire. The boss had come over from Sicily with his folks at age eight and had lived in Bath Beach forever. He spoke Italian and English but little Spanish. Jack had taken Spanish in high school and some at Rutgers. The Dominicans who made up the rest of Giovanni’s crew spoke next to no English.

Giovanni worked them all like dogs seven days a week but no harder than he worked himself. He liked to say, “You’ll get plenty of days off – in the winter.” He paid cash, four bucks an hour – twenty cents above minimum wage – with no overtime but also no deductions.

Though a newcomer, Jack quickly became Giovanni’s go-to guy. He could understand the Dominicans if they spoke slowly, and was able to relay the boss’s work orders to them.

Before Jack, that had been Rico’s job. He spoke little English, but enough to act as go-between. He probably felt demoted. Plus, Giovanni loved to talk and would launch long, rambling monologues about wine, women, and Italy at Jack, something never possible with Rico. That had to gall him. He’d been with Giovanni – or jefe, as he called him – for years, then Jack strolls in and becomes right-hand man within weeks of his arrival.

Jack had come to like Giovanni. He was something of a peacock with his pompadour hair and waxed mustache, and could be a harsh taskmaster when they were running late or weather put him behind schedule. But he was unfailingly fair, paying on time and to the dime.

He liked his “wetbacks” and respected how hard they worked. But his old-country values didn’t allow much respect for his clients.

“A man who won’t work his own land don’t deserve it.”

Jack had lost count of how many times he’d heard him mutter that as they’d unload the movers and blowers and weed whackers from the trailer. Giovanni charged jaw-dropping lawn maintenance fees, but people paid him. He had the quality homeowners wanted most in their gardener: He showed up. On top of that, he and his crew did good work.

On this otherwise unremarkable late October day, the Two Paisanos crew was in Forest Hills performing a fall cleanup around a two-story Tudor in the shadow of the West Side Tennis stadium. Last month they’d worked at the club itself, planting mums for the fall. His dad was a big tennis fan and Jack remembered seeing the place on TV when the US Open was held here.

Carlos, Juan, and Ramon were happy-go-lucky sorts who loved having a job and money to spend in the midst of a recession. But Rico had a chip on his shoulder. Today he’d started in the moment he got in the truck. Childish stuff. He was seated behind Jack so he began jabbing his knees against Jack’s seat back. Jack seethed. The months of bad ’tude and verbal abuse were getting to him. But he did his best to ignore the guy. Rico never seemed to be playing with a full deck anyway, and appeared to be missing more cards than usual today.

When they reached the work site Rico started with the name-calling in Spanish. One thing lacking in his Spanish classes in Rutgers had been vernacular obscenities. But Jack had picked up quite a few since July. Rico was using them all. Usually the comments were directed at Jack, but today Rico had expanded into Jack’s ancestry, particularly his parents. With Jack’s mother buried less than a year now, the guy was stomping on hallowed ground. But he didn’t know that. Jack set his jaw, tamped the fire rising within, and put on his headphones. He started UB40’s latest spinning in his Discman. The easy, mid-tempo reggae of “Labour of Love 2” offered a peaceful break from Rico’s rants.

Rico must have become royally pissed that he couldn’t get a rise. So pissed he hauled off and sucker punched Jack in the face.

As his headphones went flying and pain exploded in his cheek, Jack felt something snap. Not physically, but mentally, emotionally. A darkness enveloped him. He’d felt it surge up in him before, but never like this. He took martial arts classes but whatever he’d learned was lost in an explosive rush of uncontrollable rage. Usually he fought it, but this time he embraced it. A dark joy filled him as he leaped at Rico with an animal howl.

He pounded his face, feeling his nose snap beneath his knuckles, his lips shred against his teeth. Rico reeled back, and Jack quarter spun his body as he aimed a kick at his left knee. His boot heel connected with the outside of the knee, caving it inward. Even over the roaring in his ears he could hear the ligaments snap. As Rico went down, Jack stomped on the knee, then kicked him in the ribs, once, twice. As Rico clutched his chest and rolled onto his side, Jack picked up a bowling-ball-size rock from the garden border and raised it to smash his head.

A pair of powerful arms encircled him and wrenched him around. He lost his grip on the rock and it landed on the grass, denting the turf. Giovanni’s voice was shouting close behind his left ear.

“Enough! He’s down! He’s finished! Stop it, for fuck’s sake!”

The darkness receded, Jack’s vision cleared, and he saw Rico on the ground, his face bloodied, wailing as one arm clutched his ribs and another his knee.

“All right,” Jack said, relaxing as he stared in wonder at Rico. “All right.”

What just happened?

Maybe five seconds had passed. So little time, so much damage.

Carlos, Juan, and Ramon stood in a semicircle behind Rico, their gazes shifting from Jack to their fallen roommate, their expressions alternating between fear and anger.

Giovanni released him from behind and spun him around. He looked frightened, upset.

“What were you gonna do? Kill him?”

“I don’t know. I mean, no. I guess I lost it.”

“Lost it! Damn right, you lost it!” He looked over Jack’s shoulder at where Rico lay. “Christ, I never seen anything like it.” His expression darkened. “You better get outa here.”

“What?”

“You can catch an E or an F back into the city over on Seventy-first Avenue.”

Jack felt a new surge of anger, but nothing like before. “Hey, aren’t we forgetting something here? I was the guy who was minding his own business when he–”

“I know all about it, but you’re still upright and moving. He ain’t walking anywhere after the way you fucked up his knee.”

“So–”

“So nothing. I know these guys. They’re thick like brothers. You stick around you’re gonna find some hedge trimmers chewing up your face. Or a shovel flattening the back of your head. Git. They’ll cool down if you’re not around.”

The heat surged again. He was ready to take on the remaining three right now.

“They’ll cool down? What about me?”

“Don’t be a jerk. You’re outnumbered. Move. I’ll call you later.”

“Yeah?” Jack said, resisting the urge to take a swing at Giovanni. “Don’t bother.”

Railing silently at the unfairness of it all, he picked up his Discman and started walking.

The rest of the book is here: Cold City

1991

DARK CITY

Book 2 of the Early Years Trilogy

It’s half a year after the events of Cold City. Jack still has yet to find his place in the world. Not that he wants to belong, he simply wants to establish a life. He crosses paths with Drexler and the Order, but neither is aware of the other.

Desert Storm is raging in Iraq but Jack has more pressing matters at home. His favorite bar, The Spot, is about to be sold out from under his pal Julio. Julio wants to take a baseball bat to his nemesis’s head, but Jack has a better plan. He takes the reins and, in classic Jack style, demonstrates his innate talent for seeing biters get bit. With a body count even higher than in the first novel, Dark City hurtles Jack toward the final volume in which all scores will be settled, all debts paid.

I’m not a big fan of starting books off with a bang. I prefer a slow build. But in Dark City I couldn’t resist this chase along the roof of a subway I’ve ridden at least a million times. (Okay, half a million.)

Ready? Go!

DARK CITY

(sample)

February 23, 1991

The van speeding down Seventh swerved toward him as he stepped off the curb. Would have ripped off a kneecap if he hadn’t spotted it out of the corner of his eye and jumped back in time.

He’d come to West 23rd Street hunting lunch. Despite its grit and grime and unabashedly crass commercialism – or maybe because of it – Jack dug the big two-way cross street. Only a few blocks from his apartment, its mostly tiny storefronts offered a cross section of all the low-end merchandise available throughout the city, a mishmash of deep-discount, off-brand electronics, cheap luggage, Gucci knock-offs, the ever-present XXX peep shows, a dizzying selection of ethnic fast foods, plus an endless variety of VHS tapes, music cassettes, and CDs – all bootleg.

The humanity crowding the sidewalks was always varied, but on a Saturday at midday, despite the February cold, even more so. As a white guy in jeans and a denim jacket over a flannel shirt, Jack was barely noticeable among the yellow, black, and various shades of mocha, the saried Hindus, turbaned Sikhs, straights, gays, and unsures, socialists and socialites, bankers and bohos, tourists and transvestites, holies and harlots, felons and fashion victims, viragos and virgins, commies and capitalists, artistes and Aryans.

He was going to miss the bustling energy when he moved uptown, but reminded himself it would remain just a few subway stops away.

Still, despite all the varied bright colors, the city had a dark feel. The recession was holding on, casting a pall that refused to lift, and everyone was feeling it.

Back in the day, his father used to come into the city now and then to visit Uncle Stu in his three-story brownstone a little ways downtown and toward Eighth Avenue. Sometimes he’d drag Jack along. Dad would always come away with samples of Uncle Stu’s single-malt Scotches. Long gone was the Nedick’s where they’d stop and grab hot dogs with the weird rolls and delicious pickle mustard. A McDonald’s filled its shoes now, but as much as he liked Big Macs, he wasn’t in burger mode at the moment. He eyed the line of chromed street carts along the curb. One offered Sabrett hot dogs – pass – while another offered mystery meat on a stick – pass again.

He paused near Seventh Avenue, before the redbrick and wrought-iron façade of the Chelsea Hotel. Across the street he spotted a gyro cart he’d visited in the past. The owner, Nick, had a vertical propane rotisserie that he used to cook the meat. He fresh-carved the slices and wrapped them in a pita with onions and a cucumber-yogurt sauce. Jack’s mouth was already watering. Yeah, that would do nicely.

That was when he’d stepped off the curb. That was when the gray, unmarked commercial van damn near killed him.

It swerved to a screeching halt a half dozen feet away and he took a step toward it, ready to give the driver hell. But then the side panel slid back and three dark-skinned guys about his age erupted from within. Two wore beads and had scarf-wrapped heads, the third wore a backward trucker cap – typical streetwear, nothing special. Then Jack noticed that all three carried short, shiny machetes and looked out for blood. When Rico leaned out the front passenger window and screamed something in Spanish, Jack got the picture.

He turned and ran.

Last fall he'd been leading an uncomplicated life as a cash-paid landscaper / gardener, the lone gringo among Dominican immigrants in a five-man crew for Two Paisanos Landscaping. Rico, a member of that crew, came to view Jack as a rival for his leadership position. Pre-Jack, he’d been the boss’s go-to guy. After Jack joined, Giovanni Pastorelli came to depend more and more on Jack because they shared English as a first language. The seething Rico began to ride Jack, most times via colorful Dominican insults that went beyond Jack’s rudimentary Spanish, occasionally punctuated by a push or a bump. Jack realized the problem but didn’t see what he could do about it, so he let it ride for months until the day Rico culminated a week of relentless heckling with a sucker punch to the jaw.

Jack still didn’t remember much of what happened next. Apparently he flashed into berserker mode, launching a Hell's Angels-style counterattack so vicious it left him in shock and a battered Rico coiled on the ground clutching a ruined knee.

The other Dominicans were Rico's buddies who used machetes to clear brush. The boss, Giovanni, fearing Jack would end up with one of those blades in his back, had fired him for his own safety.

It should have ended there. But for some reason it hadn't. Giovanni had mentioned a link to a machete-wielding street gang called DDP – Dominicans Don't Play – and told Jack he'd better get himself a gun. Jack had bought that gun but didn't have it on him now – he'd only stepped out to grab some lunch, for Christ’s sake.

Jack raced west, putting some distance between himself and his pursuers. He glanced over his shoulder and noticed the three matóns after him all wore baggy gangsta jeans halfway down their asses. That had to slow them down. He recognized the one in the trucker cap – Ramon – from Giovanni’s landscaping crew, but the other two were strangers. DDP members? Why wasn't Rico, the guy with the biggest grudge, among them? Had he gone in another direction, trying to flank him?

Couldn't think about that now. Subway entrance ahead near Eighth Avenue. That van could be in motion, complicating things. Best to get off the street. A subterranean wind blew against his face as he scrambled down the white-tiled gullet into the token area. Train arriving. No time for a token and no transit cop in sight, so he waved to the attendant as he raced past the booths, hopped atop the turnstile, and leaped across. Good luck to his pursuers trying a turnstile hop in those saggy pants.

The fetid gale was stronger here, flowing up from the subway platforms one level below. A DOWNTOWN sign hung above a stairway to his left, UPTOWN over another to his right. He didn't care which direction he went, all he wanted was to go-go-go. The big question: Where was the train arriving – uptown or downtown side?

The wind began to die with the tortured screeee of train brakes.

Where-where-where?

The sound echoed from all directions, but seemed louder from the left. Without breaking stride he veered toward the downtown sign. As he pelted down the stairs he saw the train pull to a stop below. An A train. Great. Get on that and he could take it all the way to Far Rockaway if he wished.

The loose weekend crowd on the platform gravitated toward the train as the doors slid back. Jack darted among the travelers, debating whether to take the train or climb the next set of stairs back up and crouch near the top while his pursuers boarded the train in search of him. Then he saw a rag-topped face peer over the railing.

No dummies, these matóns. And they moved fast despite their potato-sack jeans.

The guy on the steps let out a high-pitched howl as Jack raced by. The arriving passengers had left the train and hit the stairs by then. Jack reached the third set and faked going up a few steps, then leaped over the rail and through the subway doors just as they started to close.

The DDPer closest behind him didn’t make it. He jabbed his machete through the crack, barely missing Jack. It had black symbols carved into its chromed surface. He tried to use it to pry open the doors, but the train had started moving and that wasn’t going to happen. Ramon and the other DDPer came up behind their buddy and the trio made all sorts of gestures – shaking fists, pointing fingers – while shouting threats in Spanish. As they slid away, Jack refrained from any taunts, just stared and concentrated on catching his breath while the adrenaline buzz faded.

What would they have done with those machetes if they’d caught him? Decapitate him?

And why wasn’t Rico with them? Because he couldn’t be with them? Because Jack had screwed up his knee so bad he had to stay back in the truck?

Shit. Jack hadn’t meant to hurt him like that. Well, yeah, he must have wanted to hurt him in the moment – wanted to kill him, in fact – but to think that he’d caused permanent damage to a guy just for acting like a dumbass… he didn’t like that.

This rage percolating within…he was a little better at controlling it now. A little…

He pressed the side of his face against the window, expecting to see a receding cluster of matóns on the edge of the platform, and maybe hoping Rico would be with them. Instead he saw them running beside the train. They’d stuck their machetes in their belts and were climbing into the spaces between the cars behind his.

Crap! They weren’t giving up.

Jack started weaving forward through the three-quarter-full car. Fourteenth Street was the next stop but the train was moving so slowly, he’d run out of train before then. As he opened the sliding door to move to the next car, he looked up. Blackness above. A soot-darkened tunnel ceiling. How much clearance? Two feet? Six? Subway surfers were doing it – at least that was what the papers said. Why couldn’t he?

Well, he could climb up there, no problem. But could he survive? Stories abounded about some of those subway surfers having fatal encounters with low-hanging crossbeams.

He closed the door behind him and looked back through the car he’d just left. A DDPer was just opening the door at the rear end. Pretty clear nothing good was going to happen to Jack if he stayed at floor level. He had a feeling his only chance to come through this intact was up there.

He braced a foot on one of the side chains, then hauled himself up on the right handrail. He poked his head above the roof level and got a faceful of wind. Wan wash from caged bulbs set in the tunnel walls revealed the subway car’s beveled roof, its smooth surface broken along the center by a series of low vents. Jack would have much preferred a flat roof – that curved surface made it too easy to slide off. Maybe he should rethink –

The door to the car he’d just left slid open. A quick glance showed the top of a scarf-wrapped head.

With no other choice, Jack scrambled up and started crawling along the filthy car roof. He heard a clang, felt a vibration near his trailing foot, and knew the matón had slashed at him with his machete. Jack increased his crawl speed, dragging himself along through the caked layers of soot and pigeon droppings – the A train ran above ground for much of its outer-borough route – and didn’t look back until he’d reached the first vent. The DDPer had just gained the roof and started crawling after him.

Shit.

Jack was half turned to face him when he felt a stinging impact just below his left shoulder. The guy had taken a wild, full-extension slash with his blade and connected. His dark eyes held a kind of crazy glee and he grinned through a wispy goatee as he raised his machete for another swing. But a passing crossbeam caught the blade and ripped it from his fingers, sending it flying with a ringing clang. That leveled the playing field.

“Now we’re even, asshole!”

Jack felt the darkness rising. He resisted a mad urge to slide toward him, stick his thumbs in his eyes, and pop them from their sockets.

The strobing lights showed the guy’s pained expression and Jack could tell by the way he tucked his left hand against his chest that the blow must have hurt – sprained his wrist no doubt.

“Hope you broke it!”

Furious, the DDPer raised his head and shouted something Jack didn’t catch just as another crossbeam flashed by close above, tearing the scarf from his head. The glee left his eyes as his expression turned terrified. He did a reverse belly-scramble and slid back down between the cars.

Yeah, you gotta be bugfuck nuts to come up here.

Jack checked his arm. The denim jacket was sliced over his deltoid and blood seeped through. He’d barely felt it when it happened, but it hurt now. Damn, that blade must have been sharp.

He resumed his forward belly crawl along the roof, not sure if he should stop in the middle or try to make it to the next car. He paused midway, then kept moving, despite the pain in his left shoulder. If he could hop the gap to the next car…

Light ahead. The 14th Street station. The train started to brake, sliding Jack forward toward the gap. As it pulled into the station, he looked ahead and saw no crossbeams overhead. He took that as a signal to rise to a crouch and move. The deceleration pushed him to a higher speed than he intended, scaring him a little, but that turned into a good thing when he reached the gap just as a familiar face popped up for a look.

Ramon must have worked his way to the forward end of the car to cut Jack off should he try just what he was doing. His eyes went wide when he saw Jack charging him. He raised his machete but too late. Jack leaped the gap just as the train ground to a halt. Ramon lost his perch with the stop and, arms flailing, dropped to the inter-car platform.

But he wasn’t down long. As the doors hissed open below, Ramon was crawling up to the roof behind Jack and giving chase.

Mind racing in search of a plan, Jack kept loping forward. Jump off to the platform? He glanced down and saw the debarking passengers weaving out among the new ones shuffling in. The car roof wasn’t that far above the platform but a jump ran the risk of landing wrong – just a little off and his knee could twist or his ankle could go under, leaving him a sitting duck. Then he saw a DDPer, the one who’d lost his scarf and machete, watching him from the platform as he wrung his injured wrist.

That put a jump out of the question, so he hopped the gap to the next car.

Again, no sign of Rico. Because he wasn’t able to get around?

Couldn’t think about that now. Had to do something – and quick, because he was running out of train. Only two and a half more cars to go. He heard the doors below slide shut so he dropped to his knees and braced himself for the lurching start. Looking back he saw Ramon still on his feet and closing fast. He was trotting atop the car behind, grinning and brandishing his garden-variety black-steel machete. He hopped the gap between his car and Jack’s–

–just as the train bucked forward. The sudden move made his leap fall short. His sneaker made toe contact with the car roof’s rear edge, then slipped off. His expression turned from fierce grin to shock and fear as he dropped out of sight.

But not for long. Seconds later, as the train entered the tunnel, he was up again and coming Jack’s way, though this time in a crawl instead of a run. The train picked up speed and the wind carried Ramon’s trucker’s cap away, but he didn’t seem to mind. Jack continued his own crawl to the forwardmost vent duct on the roof and clung to it. He was counting on Ramon to keep coming. And he did.

Ramon and Rico and the rest of Giovanni’s DR crew had been living in Brooklyn. Probably never rode the Eighth Avenue line down here. Didn’t know that it made a sharp left turn to the east toward Sixth Avenue. Jack remembered many times needing a near-death grip on one of the poles inside to keep from bouncing off other passengers as it made that turn… just… about…

Now.

The train lurched left and Ramon began to slide right. Jack had his arms tight around the vent and stayed put. He could see Ramon’s wide, terrified eyes as he dropped his machete – two down, one to go – and scratched at the filthy, sloping surface in a frantic search for purchase.

Fat chance, pal.

Jack watched his kicking legs go over the side, heard his terrified wail as his body followed, saw his clawed hands rake the roof all the way to the edge where they caught the lip, leaving Ramon clinging to the side of the train by his fingertips.

Jack fought the wild urge to slide over and kick at those fingertips, dumping Ramon off the train. He’d bang off the side wall, bounce against the train, get spun around and around until he either fell to the tracks where he’d end up ground meat, or get caught on the outside and be dragged into West 4th. Either way, he’d be eliminated as a threat.

But he held back, remembering how he’d let his rage take over with Rico. Look where that had put him.

Instead he imagined the view from inside the car: Ramon’s panicked face pressed against the outside of a window, his prolonged scream drowned in the train noise. Would anyone look up and see? Maybe, maybe not. Would anyone pull the emergency stop cord? Again, maybe, maybe not, but leaning toward not. New Yorkers resented anyone or anything that slowed their subway ride. They might write him off as just another jerk working a variation on subway surfing. Might even want him to fall off.

The train straightened out, but Jack knew it wouldn’t be long before it angled right to enter the West 4th Street station, a big nexus point at Sixth Avenue where a half dozen or more subway lines crossed.

The train pulled into the low-ceilinged station and Jack had to stay down if he wanted to keep his head. As it stopped and the doors opened, he peeked over the right edge of the roof and saw the two DDPers rush out and peel a shaken, weak-kneed Ramon off the side of the car.

Okay, no getting out that way.

To the left, over the wall, he heard a train approaching. The uptown tracks were over there.

He rose to standing between a pair of crossbeams and looked over. Another A train was pulling into the station. The beams ran above the wall. If he could get over there…

Ignoring the oily grime and rat turds, Jack took hold of the beam before him. His left hand, slick with blood dripping down his arm from his shoulder, slipped. He wiped it dry on his jacket, then hopped up onto the beam and began to crawl along on his hands and knees. He couldn’t help but think of gymnasts he’d seen doing cartwheels and flips on something just about this wide. How the hell did they manage?

When he reached the wall he came to a vertical support that ran up into the dark. He had to rise to his feet and swing around it. A hairy maneuver, especially here. Falling off the far side would be a disaster – at best he’d lie crippled on the tracks; at worst he’d land on the third rail and get fried by six zillion volts.

He heard a shout behind him and a machine-gun rattle of Spanish. A look back showed one of the matóns on the car roof he’d just left. This guy still had his head scarf and machete. He hopped up on the same crossbeam and started crawling Jack’s way.

Okay, no time for caution. That uptown A would be pulling out in seconds. Jack did a Wallenda along the next beam, arms out, one foot in front of the other. The train’s brakes hissed as they released. It started rolling.

“No, dammit!”

Another vertical beam. Almost there. Jack swung recklessly around it and stepped on the horizontal on the far side. His sneaker landed on something squishy – a fresh rat turd? – and his foot slipped out from under him.

Oh, shit, he was falling.

At the last second he kicked out against the upright with his other foot, allowing him to belly-flop onto the slowly moving roof of the uptown A. The air whooshed out of him on impact.

He gasped, struggling for a breath. Christ, that hurt.

Still fighting for air, he managed to turn onto his side and watch the DDPer go into a half crouch, ready to jump, then change his mind. As the train picked up speed, Jack waved, then rolled onto his back, temporarily wiped out.

The rest of the story waits here: Dark City

1993

FEAR CITY

The final book of the Early Years Trilogy. Drexler and the Order are encouraging a cadre of Islamists to bring jihad to America but are suddenly backpedaling when they announce that they want to blow up the World Trade Towers. No! Anything but that! They have good reason, but we won’t learn it until Ground Zero.

This one proved a challenge. It’s a year and a half after Dark City and things are changing. Disney is moving onto 42nd Street, Times Square is starting a facelift, and Jack can’t get his fix-it business going. Everybody thinks he’s a hit man. He’s not. He’s a repairman – of situations, not appliances.

Everything in the novel has to point toward the 1993 WTC bombing. I worked out a timeline for the bombers’ activity and it definitely didn’t work for me. These guys had no sense of pacing. So I had to compress 8 weeks of activity into 11 days. I mean, come on, guys, where’s your sense of urgency?

I think I have some of the best dialogue I’ve ever written in this book. So instead of an opening scene, I’m going to present snippets of dialogue and character bits from throughout the novel.

FEAR CITY

(snippets)

"I want to find whoever did this, Abe."

"I will help you."

"And after I find them I want to take a long time killing them."

"That I will leave to you."

“You followed her all the way into Westchester County,” Abe said, “and all you got was a license plate number?”

“You sound like a T-shirt slogan.”

But where to eat?

Apparently Cristin already had an idea. “I found a cool little French place on East Sixty-first called Le Pistou.”

Jack made a face. “Really? What’s choice number two?”

“But you like French.”

“I do.” He could eat just about anything, even snails. “But I don’t know if I could eat at a place called Piss Stew.”

“It’s vegetable soup.”

He held up his hands. “Stop. You’re only making it worse.”

“What do I call you, laddie?” the boss man in the swivel chair said as the van lurched into motion.

What the hell had he stumbled into?

Jack said, “How about telling me what this is all about.”

The boss held up Jack’s pistol. “Look, it’s a wee Glock. What’d you do, leave it out in the rain?” He checked the breech, then dropped it on the carpeted floor. “That’s not a pistol.” He reached into his coat and removed a big 1911 .45. “This is a pistol.”

Jack couldn’t resist. “Okay, so you’ve seen Crocodile Dundee. Good for you.”

One of the guys up front snickered.

Burkes pointed to a draped form on the floor. “Another friend?”

Jack nodded.

Burkes wandered over to where the driver sprawled with the three arrow shafts jutting toward the ceiling from the eyes and mouth of his blood-coated face.

“And this, I take it, was not a friend.” He showed Jack a tight, grim smile. “Had a wee bit of a temper tantrum, did we?”

“Yeah. A wee.”

Burkes stood over the driver’s body. “And what’s his part in our drama?”

Jack hadn’t mentioned the key fob when he’d called. He pulled out the driver’s keys and handed them over.

“I found this in his pocket.”

Burkes gave him a questioning look as he took the keys. He turned the fob over and stared. Then he looked up at Jack, his lips working but making no sound.

Jack nodded. “Yeah, I know.”

The unspeakable was…unspeakable.

Burkes averted his eyes as he handed back the keys. “Here. It’s giving me the boak.” He took a couple of deep breaths, then kicked the driver’s body so hard it came off the ground.

“Cunt!”

Jack parked before a two-story brick colonial that looked pretty much like every other house in Forest Hills. A little sign out front read:

DR. ADÈLE MOREAU

APPOINTMENT ONLY

Dr. Moreau? Really?

Burkes exited by the side of the van and walked up to the front door. A tall thin woman with odd-colored hair answered his knock; she carried a little dog in her arms. She pointed to the garage, then closed the door.

Could she be the torturer known as La Chirurgienne?

La Chirurgienne said, “Voila. No need for lifting and turning. All parts of him are accessible.”

“Want us to strip him before we go?” Rob said.

“Not necessary. I find proximity to a naked human, how shall we say, distasteful. I can cut away to expose whatever area I wish to explore.”

Explore…Jack shuddered at the way she said that.

Burkes stepped closer and jabbed a finger at her. “You will make up for that by performing IV on a second captive – gratis.”

La Chirurgienne blinked in surprise, obviously unused to people getting in her face like Burkes. But she didn’t look terribly put off by the idea.

“Very well.” She smiled and walked away. “I shall await his arrival.”

“‘IV’?” Jack said. “Like a needle? Like death from lethal injection? He deserves more than–”

“With la Chirurgienne, ‘IV’ means Infernum Viventes.”

“Still no help.”

“It’s Latin.” Burkes’s grin was not a pretty thing. “It means ‘living hell.’”

Abe finally took a great-white bite of his sausage-and-egg McMuffin. Jack had known it would not go untouched for long. He doubted any news, no matter how tragic, could kill Abe’s appetite.

After swallowing, Abe shook his head. “A mensch we’ve lost.”

Jack bit into his own McMuffin. He loved these things. “How well did you know him?”

A shrug. “Heart-to-hearts we never had. But in some men you can detect the mensch without many words. A man may hide a lot of himself, but the mensch always manages to peek through.”

Abe shook his head as he stared at him. “In town not three years and already you’ve run into smuggling, mass murder, Dominican gangs, human trafficking, torture, and international terrorism. How does this happen?”

“Just lucky I guess.”

“After all this tummel,” Abe said, “how are you going to go back to being Repairman Jack?”

“I was never Repairman Jack. That’s your thing.”

“No, it’s your thing.” He pulled a sheet of paper from under the counter and pushed it across. “Here: for the personals pages.”

Jack stared, dumbfounded.

When all else fails…

When nothing else works…

REPAIRMAN JACK

Abe said, “I can see you’re speechless with wonder and admiration. I was quite taken myself when I realized what I’d created. Like poetry it reads.”

Jack burst out laughing. “You’re kidding, right?”

“I should be kidding about your career? Your future? This is what you need to bring people with troubles to your door – or at least to your table in that bar. Just add whatever phone number you want and you’re all set.”

“How about I add yours?”

Jack said, “There’s a law somewhere: Olga’s can’t close. It’s an institution.”

She opened the menu. “Everything changes,” she said, “but not this place. Look. They still serve turkey croquettes with mashed potatoes and gravy. Ugh.”

“How can you say ‘ugh’? You never tried them. Ever.”

She’d been South Burlington County Regional High School’s only vegetarian – at least the only one as far as he knew. He could still hear her saying, If it had a face or a mother, I don’t want it on my plate.

“Well, they just sound awful. But not as awful as creamed chipped beef – which they also still have.” She gave an exaggerated shudder. “Remember how you used to order that just to gross me out?”

“On toast. Mmmm.”

One time she refused to kiss him after he’d eaten it.

“And remember how you tried to convince me that chipped beef never had a face or a mother?”

“Since the scientific community has yet to present convincing evidence to the contrary, I persist in my contention.”

Julio came by. “Drinking?”

Burkes said, “Thought you’d never ask. I’m desperate for a bevvy.” He pointed to Jack’s glass. “What’s that?”

“Rolling Rock.” Jack hadn’t been able to look at a brew yesterday. But that had been yesterday.

Burkes made a face. “An American lager? Not likely.” He turned back to Julio. “Got anything good to drink? Something with some body to it?”

“You mean like Guinness?”

Burkes slapped the table. “Now you’re talking, lad!”

“We ain’t got none.”

Jack pushed back a laugh. He’d seen that coming.

Read the rest here: Fear City

February

SIBS

Sibs is the only one of my fifty-plus novels with a strong erotic element. I usually avoid sex scenes. (Yeah, I hear you: Write what you know, Wilson.) But really, they offer too much potential for purple prose. And in too many cases I think they're unnecessary.

But they were necessary in Sibs. The villain is a voluptuary and sex is what he's after. So I had to show rather than simply hint. The result is a mixture of horror and police procedural, with erotica fueling the plot.

The seeds of Sibs were planted decades before its publication when I was writing and rewriting a short story about a unique form of sexual domination. When I finally got it right, Weird Tales published it as "Menage a Trois" (later reprinted in the first Hot Blood anthology).

But all along I'd been thinking about another variant on the story, and when I devised the final twist in the spring of 1990, I had to drop everything and write it. I was in the middle of Reprisal but I put it aside and sat down and wrote Sibs in nine weeks (as a part-time writer). I was doing 50 pages a day sometimes. Like taking dictation. It's a wonderful experience every writer should have. It consumed me. That fire is reflected in the pace of the book. Sibs has, perhaps, some shortcomings in that hellbent-for-leather pace, but I didn't want go back and tinker with it. Something special there, the way it gushed from me. I can't say it's a terribly nuanced novel, but it's one of my favorites for the sheer joy of being able to rap that thing out. It grabs you by the throat and does not let go.

For those interested in inter-story connections, Sibs has a number of links to the Secret History: The most obvious is that the Gati family has obviously been touched by the Otherness. How that happened, we’ll never know. What we do know: Jack uses Dr. Gates' house as part of a fix in Legacies; in All the Rage, Luc Monnet bids on wine offered by the Gates estate; the Gati family in Sibs is featured in "Menage a Trois" where a Detective Burke plays a part in the framing sections, just as he does in "The Cleaning Machine," which happens to be about one of the Seven Infernals.

Here’s the opening chapter. You’ve got to admit it’s a doozy…

SIBS

(sample)

February 4

12:45 a.m.

The evening was uneventful until it got crazy. Craziness had been the farthest thing from Ed Bannion's mind when he invited his younger brother into the city.

Phil came in through the Lincoln from Tinton Falls, New Jersey, and Ed met him at a midtown parking lot. No special occasion, just keeping in touch. They went downtown and then began a steady march back up: Before-dinner drinks at The Airplane in SoHo, an off-off-Broadway play in Kips Bay, shrimp in green sauce at El Quijote in Chelsea, and finally a nitecap in the Oak Bar at the Plaza. And it was there in the Oak Bar, there in the heart of the jewel in Ivana Trump's tiara, while they were standing side by side, each with a foot on the brass rail, staring at the misty painting of the Plaza fountain behind the cash register, that the young blonde squeezed between them and ordered a double JD on the rocks.

"Hi, guys!" she said, bright and cheery with a smile that made Ed wince in its glare.

A real piece. She looked around twenty-five but she could have been thirty. Either way, she was younger than Ed. Her wavy blond hair was like a pale cloud around her head, and her face had a fresh, All-American look that contrasted sharply with the high-slit leather mini-skirt and the low-cut sweater that exposed smooth, bouncy crescents of her breasts. She had what they call a bod that wouldn't quit. Sexy as all hell, and not the least bit shy.

"So, what's happening here with you Plaza-type dudes?"

"We're not–” Ed began but Phil cut him off.

"Just hanging out," Phil said. "Waiting for something to happen."

"Yeah?" she said. "My name's Ingrid, and I'm waiting for the same thing. Isn't that something?"

"That's something, all right," Phil purred.

Ed stared at his brother who had suddenly become cool, smooth, and seductive. He hardly recognized him. Ed was a bachelor, but good lord, Phil had a wife and child back home in Jersey!

"You guys look alike. You related?"

"We're brothers," Ed said, feeling he should add his two cents. The clash of her bold and brassy attitude with her angel-soft good looks excited him. "I'm the older one – but not by much."

"Yeah?" she said with a seductive smile. "You never could tell. You guys come here often?"

"This is our headquarters whenever we're in the Apple," Phil said.

Ed struggled to keep from laughing out loud.

"Me, too," Ingrid said. "I've got an appointment with Mike Nichols this week. He's shooting his next feature right here in Manhattan, you know, and my agent's got me an audition with him. So I'm just killing some time while I wait for Solly to firm up the exact time and place. What're you guys in town for?"

"We're in textiles," Phil said with this oily grin. "Y'know...rugs and stuff? We sell textiles by the mile."

Ed was shocked by his brother's facile way with a lie. Phil was a Wa-Wa manager. He wouldn't know a broadloom from a flying carpet.

"Really?" Ingrid said. "That sounds boring as shit. Can you guys fuck?"

Ed saw his brother's eyes bulge as he felt his own jaw drop. That sweet face, those innocent eyes. And talking like that!

Phil glanced quickly at Ed, then back at Ingrid.

"Sure we do. What do you think we are, queer?"

"I don't know," she said. "I've been crammed in between the two of you and neither one of you has even tried to feel me up. Something's wrong here."

"My brother and I were raised to be gentlemen," Phil said.

"I kinda like that," she said, slipping a finger inside Phil's shirt, "but you can carry that polite shit too far. Want to come up to my room? It's got a great view of the park."

"I don't know about that," Phil said. "What's it gonna cost me?"

Her smile was sweet. "Cost? Nothing. My treat. But there's a condition."

Ed didn't like the sound of this.

"Phil, uh, maybe you should–”

"The both of you have to come," Ingrid said.

Ed swallowed and wet his dry lips.

"You want both of us?"

She looked at him and laughed. His expression must have reflected the excited turmoil within him.

"Yeah! Guys always run out of steam before I do. One ain't enough, know what I mean? So I like to have a back-up along. That too kinky for you fellows?"

Thoughts of herpes, syphilis, the clap, and AIDS ran through Ed's mind. Then she ran a hand over his crotch. From the startled look on Phil's face, Ed guessed that she was doing the same to his brother.

Phil's voice was strained. "What floor?"

Before long they were twelve stories above Central Park South. Ingrid wasted no time once they were in the room. She offered them each a toot from the small vial of coke she produced, took a good snort herself, then knelt down between them and unzipped their flies.

And as the interlude progressed, it got crazier and crazier. This was one hungry lady.

Eventually it came to a point where Phil was sprawled back on the hotel bed, naked, moaning as Ingrid worked on him. She knelt on the carpet with her thighs spread wide as her head bobbed up and down over Phil's pelvis. And Ed...he knelt behind her, gripping her black garter belt like a rodeo rider hanging onto the reins of a bucking bronco, his pelvis slapping against her smooth buttocks as he slid in and out of her.

She paused and lifted her head from Phil.

"Baby, don't stop now," Phil said. His voice was thick, hoarse.

She turned her head and looked over her shoulder at Ed. In the dim light filtering across the bed from the open bathroom door, he could see her face. Her eyes glistened and her cheeks were flushed. Beautiful, and as insatiable as she was uninhibited.

"Do it faster," she said. "And harder! I want to come, damn it!"

Ed said nothing. He'd already come once himself, and was climbing the upslope toward number two. He picked up the pace, ramming deeper into her.

"Oh, yessss!" she said through a groan, and then went back to doing Ed.

I just don't believe this! Ed told himself for the hundredth time in the last hour.

This was the kind of thing that happened only in porno movies, in fantasies, not in real life. At least not in Ed Bannion's life. Fifteen years in this town – sixteen in August – and never anything even close to an encounter like this. When he'd got the job with Paramount he'd been a sex-starved law school grad dreaming of starlet sandwiches and orgies. Even if he was in legal and based in New York, Paramount was Paramount, right? Wrong. Nothing! He'd never even seen a starlet, let alone a star. Paramount – hah! He might as well have been working for Exxon for all the poontang he'd got through the company.

But tonight! Tonight made up for the long wait. He'd carry the memory of this to his grave. Maybe even beyond.

He felt the pressure growing within the basement of his pelvis, surging outward, building...

He leaned forward and reached around her, grabbing her breasts.

...building...

He buried his face in her fragrant, wavy hair, and nuzzling the nape of her neck.

...building...

Suddenly he knew he was past the point of no return. He stiffened, cried out, then bit down hard as he exploded within her.

Ingrid screamed in pain. She straightened up and twisted, pulling free of Ed as she rose to her feet. She stood there, naked but for her garter belt and black stockings, staring at Ed and his brother, her hands to her mouth, her eyes wide with what looked to Ed like shock and horror.

"What's the matter, babe?" Phil said.

"Oh, no!" she moaned. There was no passion in the sound, only revulsion and unplumbed misery. "Oh, God, no!"

Ed turned cold inside. Something was terribly wrong here. What–?

She turned to run and immediately slammed into the wall. She bounced off it and blindly dashed toward Ed, accelerating as she passed him.

"Christ, no! The window!" Ed said and tried to grab her leg.

But she was moving too fast. He missed her and could only watch helplessly as she rammed into the lower pane of the big double-hung window. For an instant it looked as if she might bounce off that, too, but then came a sharp crash like a shot, like an explosion, and suddenly the glass was coming apart all around her and she was still moving outward, taking a million bright dagger shards with her. And then she was gone, a keening wail trailing behind her.

Ed remained kneeling on the carpet, frozen in shock, shivering in the cold wind pouring through the shattered window, thinking this couldn't be real, this couldn't be happening, listening to the terrified wail that continued long after she was gone from view, much longer than it should have. And then he realized that the sound was coming from him.

You can find the rest of the story here: Sibs

A related story, “Menage a Trois,” (along with many others) can be found here: Soft & Others

Summer

THE TOMB

(the covers from the 2-volume Japanese version;

this artist is the only one to nail the rakoshi)

Another novel that would not die… featuring a character who would not die.

The necklaces worn by Kusum and Kolabati are intimately tied to the Secret History and becaome crucial to the outcome of Nightworld.

Capsule version: Jack is an urban mercenary in Manhattan, a self-made outcast who lives in the interstices of modern society. A ghost in our machine: no official identity, no social security number, pays no taxes. He has a violent streak he sometimes finds hard to control. He hires out for cash to "fix" situations that have no legal remedy.

The name Repairman Jack comes from his gunrunner pal, Abe. Jack’s not crazy about it, but he lives with it. He’s not a vigilante, not a do-gooder. He’s not out to right wrongs. Nor is he out to change the world or fight crime. (He’s a career criminal, after all, as are many of his friends.) He’s not Batman. He’s just a guy with a devious mind who likes his work best when he can help what goes around come around. If you read him carefully you’ll see he gets a real jolt out of running a scam or setting up someone to be hoisted on his own petard.

He came from a dream. The scene on the roof in The Tomb was the dream, then I worked backward and forward to create a character who could survive that situation. I’ve been a libertarian forever, so I figured I’d act out my libertarian dreams, you know, make this guy an anarchist with no identity.

I decided at the outset to make him an anti-Jason Bourne – with no black-ops, SEAL, or Special Forces training, no CIA or police background, no connection to officialdom. In other words, no safety net. No one in the government he could call on. He has to rely on his own wits and his own network.

He was not intended as a series character. I intended a one-shot, which is kind of obvious at the end of book. As I finished The Tomb, I thought, Well, this character is great – so I gotta make it look like guy is dead or they’ll want more. I had other books planned out and didn’t want to get locked into a series.

The thing was, The Tomb hit the bestseller lists, won the Porgie Award from The West Coast Review of Books, and never went out of print. It kept selling and creating more and more Repairman Jack fans, clamoring for more Jack. I resisted a second novel for 14 years… until Jack became a way out of a trap I got myself into with a multi-book contract. (More on that when we get to Legacies.)

Here’s the opening. Very low key. No action. I want you to spend a little time with this guy and realize that he’s different.

THE TOMB

(sample)

Manhattan

Thursday

1

Repairman Jack awoke with light in his eyes, white noise in his ears, and an ache in his back.

He’d fallen asleep on the couch in the spare bedroom where he kept his DVD player and projection TV. He turned his head toward the set. A nervous tweed pattern buzzed around on the six-foot screen while the air conditioner in the right half of the double window beside it worked full blast to keep the room at seventy.

He got to his feet with a groan and shut off the TV. The hiss of white noise stopped. He leaned over and touched his toes, then straightened and rotated his lower spine. His back was killing him. That couch was made for sitting, not sleeping.

He stepped to the player and ejected the disk. He’d fallen asleep during the closing credits of the 1931 Frankenstein, part one of Repairman Jack's unofficial James Whale Festival.

Poor Henry Frankenstein, he thought, slipping the disk into its box. Despite all evidence to the contrary, despite what everyone around him thought, Henry had been sure he was sane.

Jack located the proper slot in the rack on the wall, shoved Frankenstein in, and pulled out its neighbor: Bride of Frankenstein, part two of his private James Whale Festival.

A glance out the window revealed the usual vista of sandy shore, calm blue ocean, and supine sunbathers. He was tired of the view. Especially since some of the bricks had started showing through. Three years since he'd had the scene painted on the blank wall facing the windows of this and the other bedroom. Long enough. The beach scene no longer interested him. Perhaps a rain forest mural would be better. With lots of birds and reptiles and animals hiding in the foliage. Yes... a rain forest. He filed the thought away. He'd have to keep an eye out for someone who could do the job justice.

The phone began ringing in the front room. Who that could be? He'd changed his number a couple of months ago. Only a few people had it. He didn't bother to lift the receiver. The answering machine would take care of that. He heard a click, heard his own voice start his standard salutation:

"Pinocchio Productions...I'm not in right now, but if you'll–”

A woman's voice broke in over his own, her tone impatient. "Pick up if you're there, Jack. Otherwise I'll call back later."

Gia!

Jack nearly tripped over his own feet in his rush to the phone.

"Gia? That you?"

"Yes, it's me." Her voice sounded flat, almost resentful.

"God! It's been a long time!" Two months. Forever. He had to sit down. "I'm so glad you called."

"It's not what you think, Jack."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm not calling for myself. If it were up to me I wouldn't be calling at all. But Nellie asked me to."

His jubilation faded, but he kept talking. "Who's Nellie?" He drew a blank on the name.

"Nellie Paton. You must remember Nellie and Grace, the two English ladies?"

"Oh, yeah. How could I forget? They introduced us."

"I've managed to forgive them."

Jack let that go by without comment. "What's the problem?"

"Grace has disappeared. She hasn't been seen since she went to bed Monday night."

He remembered Grace Westphalen: a very prim and proper Englishwoman pushing seventy. Not the eloping sort.

"Have the police–?"

"Of course. But Nellie wanted me to call you to see if you'd help. So I'm calling."

"Does she want me to come over?"

"Yes. If you will."

"Will you be there?"

She gave an exasperated sigh. "Yes. Are you coming or not?"

"I'm on my way."

"Better wait. The patrolmen who were here said a detective from the department would be coming by this morning. "

"Oh." That wasn't good.

"I thought that might slow you up."

She didn't have to sound so smug about it.

"I'll be there after lunch."

"You know the address?"

"I know it's a yellow townhouse on Sutton Square. There's only one."

"I'll tell her to expect you."

And then she hung up.

Jack tossed the receiver in his hand and cradled it on the base.

He was going to see Gia today. She’d called him. She hadn't been friendly, and she’d said she was calling for someone else – but she’d called. That was more than she’d done since she’d walked out. He couldn't help feeling good.

He strolled through the third-floor apartment's front room that served as living room and dining room. He found the room immensely comfortable, but few visitors shared his enthusiasm. His best friend, Abe Grossman, had, in one of his more generous moods, described the room as "claustrophobic." When Abe was feeling grumpy he said it made the Addams Family house look like it had been decorated by Bauhaus.

Old movie posters covered the walls along with bric-a-brac shelves loaded with the neat stuff Jack picked up in forgotten junk stores during his wanderings through the city. He wound his way through a collection of old Victorian golden oak furniture that left little room for anything else: a seven-foot hutch, intricately carved, a fold-out secretary, a sagging, high-backed sofa, a massive claw-foot dining table, two end tables whose legs each ended in a bird's foot clasping a crystal sphere, and his favorite, a big, wing-back chair.

He reached the bathroom and started the hated morning ritual of shaving. As he ran the razor over his cheeks and throat he again considered the idea of a beard. He didn't have a bad face. Brown eyes, dark brown hair growing perhaps a little too low on his forehead. A nose neither too big nor too small. He smiled at himself in the mirror. Not an altogether hideous grimace – what they used to call a shit-eating grin. The teeth could have been whiter and straighter, and the lips were on the thin side, but not a bad smile. An inoffensive face. As an added bonus, a wiry, well muscled, five-eleven frame went along with the face at no extra charge.

So what's not to like?

His smile faltered.

Ask Gia. She seems to think she knows what's not to like.

But all that was going to change starting today.

After a quick shower, he dressed and downed a couple of bowls of Cocoa Puffs, then strapped on his ankle holster and slipped the world's smallest .45, a Semmerling skeleton model LM-4, into it. He knew the holster was going to be hot against his leg, but he never went out unarmed. His peace of mind would compensate for any physical discomfort.

He checked the peephole in the front door, then twisted the central knob, retracting the four bolts at the top, bottom, and both sides. The heat in the third floor hall slammed against him at the threshold. He was wearing Levi's and a lightweight short-sleeve shirt. He was glad he’d skipped the undershirt. The humidity in the hall wormed its way into his clothes and oozed over his skin as he headed down to the street.

Jack stood on the front steps for a moment. Sunlight glared sullenly through the haze over the roof of the Museum of Natural History far down the street to his right. The wet air hung motionless above the pavement. He could see it, smell it, taste it – and it looked, smelled, and tasted dirty. Dust, soot, and lint laced with carbon monoxide, with perhaps a hint of rancid butter from the garbage can around the corner in the alley.

Ah! The Upper West Side in August.

He ambled down to the sidewalk and walked west along the row of brownstones that lined his street. Along the way he pulled out his Tracfone and dialed his office number, then a four-digit code. A recorded voice – not Jack's – came over the wire with the familiar message:

"This is Repairman Jack. I'm out on a call now, but when you hear the tone, leave your name and number and give me a brief idea of the nature of your problem. I'll get back to you as soon as possible."

After the tone a woman's voice started talking about a problem with the timer on her dryer. Another beep and a man was looking for some free information on how to fix a blender. Jack ignored the numbers they gave; he had no intention of calling them back. But how did they get his number? He’d restricted his name to the white pages – with an incorrect street address, naturally – to cut down on appliance repair calls, but people managed to find him anyway.

The third and last voice was unique: smooth in tone, the words clipped, rapid, tinged with Britain, but definitely not British. Jack knew a couple of Pakistanis who sounded like that. The man was obviously upset, and stumbled over his words.

"Mr. Jack...my grandmother – was beaten terribly last night. I must speak to you immediately. It is terribly important."

He gave his name and a number where he could be reached.

That was one call Jack would return, even though he was going to have to turn the man down. He intended to devote all his time to Gia's problem. And to Gia. This might be his last chance with her.

He punched in the number. The clipped voice answered in the middle of the second ring.

“Yes.”

"Mr. Bahkti? This is Jack. You called my office during the night and–"

Mr. Bahkti was suddenly very guarded. "This is not the same voice on the answering machine."

Sharp, Jack thought. The voice on the machine belonged to Abe Grossman. Jack never used his own voice on the office phone. But most people didn't spot that.

"An old tape," Jack told him.

"Ahhh. Well, then. I must see you immediately, Mr. Jack. It is a matter of the utmost importance. A matter of life and death."

"I don't know, Mr. Bahkti, I–"

"You must! There can be no refusal!"

A new note had crept in. This was not a man used to hearing no. The tone had never set well with Jack.

"You don't understand. My time is already taken up with other–"

"Mr. Jack! Are the other matters crucial to a woman's life? Can they not be put aside for even a short while? My grandmother was mercilessly beaten on the streets of your city. She needs help that I cannot give her. So I've come to you."

Jack knew what Mr. Bahkti was up to. He thought he was pushing Jack's buttons. Jack mildly resented it, but he was used to it and decided to hear him out anyway.

Bahkti had already launched into his narrative.

"Her car – an American car, I might add – broke down last night. And when she–"

"Save it for later," Jack told him, happy to be the one doing the cutting-off for a change.

"You will meet me at the hospital? She is in St. Clare's–"

"No. Our first meeting will be where I say. I meet all customers on my home turf. No exceptions."

"Very well," Bahkti said with a minimum of grace. "But we must meet very soon. There is so little time."

Jack gave him the address of Julio's bar a few blocks uptown from where he stood. He checked his watch.

"It's just shy of ten now. Be there at ten-thirty sharp."

"Half an hour? I do not know if I can be there by then!"

Fine! Jack liked to give customers as little time as possible to prepare for their first meeting. "Ten-thirty. You've got ten minutes grace. Any later and I'll be gone."

"Ten-thirty," Mr. Bahkti said, and hung up.

That annoyed Jack. He’d wanted to hang up first.

He walked north on Columbus Avenue, keeping to the shade on the right. Some shops were just opening, but most had been going strong for hours.

Julio's was open. But then, Julio's rarely closed. Jack knew the first customers wandered in minutes after Julio unlocked at six in the morning. Some were just getting off their shift and stopped by for a beer, a hard-boiled egg, and a soft seat; others stood at the bar and downed a quick bracer before starting the day's work. And still others spent the better part of every day in the cool darkness.

"Jacko!" Julio cried from behind the bar. He was standing but only his head and the top half of his chest were visible.

They didn't shake hands. They knew each other too well and saw each other too often for that. They’d been friends for many years, ever since the time Julio began to suspect that his sister Rosa was getting punched around by her husband. It had been a delicate matter. Jack had fixed it for him. Since then the little man had screened Jack's customers. For Julio possessed a talent, a nose, a sixth sense of sorts for spotting members of officialdom. Much of Jack's energy was devoted to avoiding such people; his way of life depended on it. Also, in Jack's line of work he often found it necessary to make other people angry in the course of serving a customer's interests. So Julio kept an eye out for angry people.

So far, Julio had never failed him.

"Beer or business?"

"Before noon? What do you think?"

The remark earned Jack a brief dirty look from a sweaty old codger nursing a boilermaker.

Julio came out from behind the bar and followed Jack to a rear booth, drying his hands on a towel as he swaggered along. A daily regime with free weights and gymnastics had earned him thickly muscled arms and shoulders. His hair was wavy and heavily oiled, his skin swarthy, his mustache a pencil line along his upper lip.

"How many and when?"

"One. Ten-thirty." Jack slipped into the last booth and sat with a clear view of the door. The rear exit was two steps away. "Name's Bahkti. Sounds like he's from Pakistan or someplace around there."

"A man of color."

"More color than you, no doubt."

"Gotcha. Coffee?"

"Sure."

Jack thought about seeing Gia later today. A nice thought. They'd meet, they'd touch, and Gia would remember what they'd had, and maybe... just maybe... she'd realize that he wasn't such a bad guy after all. He began whistling through his teeth.

Julio gave him a strange look as he returned with a coffeepot, a cup, and the morning's Daily News.

"How come you're in such a good mood?"

"Why not?"

"You been a grouch for months now, meng."

Jack hadn't realized it had been so obvious. "Personal."

Julio shrugged and poured him a cup of coffee. Jack sipped it black while he waited. He never liked first meetings with a customer. There was always a chance he wasn't a customer but somebody with a score to settle. He got up and checked the exit door to make sure it was unlocked.

Two Con Ed workers came in for a coffee break. They took their coffee clear and golden with a foamy cap, poured into pilsner glasses as they watched the TV over the bar. Some guy was interviewing three transvestite grammar schoolteachers; everyone on the screen had greenish hair and pumpkin-colored complexions. Julio served the Con Ed men a second round, then came out from behind the bar and took a seat by the door.

Jack glanced at the paper. "Where Are the Winos?" was the headline. The press was getting lots of mileage out of the rapid and mysterious dwindling of the city's derelict population during the past few months.

At ten-thirty-two, Mr. Bahkti came in. No doubt it was him. He wore a navy blue Nehru-type tunic. His dark skin seemed to blend into his clothes. For an instant after the door swung shut behind him, all Jack could see was a pair of eyes floating in the air at the other end of the dim tavern.

Julio approached him immediately. Words were exchanged and Jack noted the newcomer flinch away as Julio leaned against him. He seemed angry as Julio walked toward Jack with an elaborate shrug.

"He's clean," he said as he came back to Jack's booth. "Clean but weird."

"How do you read him?"

"That's jus' it – I don't read him. He's bottled up real tight. Nothing at all out of that guy. Nothing but creeps."

"What?"

"Sonthin 'bout him gimme the creeps, man. Wouldn't want to get on his wrong side. You better be sure you can make him happy before you take him on."

Jack drummed his fingers on the table. Julio's reaction made him uneasy. The little man was all macho and braggadocio. He must have sensed something pretty unsettling about Mr. Bahkti to have even mentioned it.

"What'd you do to get him riled up?" Jack asked.

"Nothin’ special. He jus’ got real ticked off when I give him my 'accidental' frisk. Didn't like that one bit. You wanna take off?"

Jack hesitated, toying with the idea of getting out now. After all, he probably was going to have to turn the man down anyway. But he had agreed to meet him, and the guy had arrived on time.

"Send him back and let's get this over with."

Julio waved Bahkti toward the booth and headed back to his place behind the bar.

Bahkti strolled toward Jack with a smooth, gliding gait that reeked of confidence and self-assurance. He was halfway down the aisle when Jack realized with a start that his left arm was missing at the shoulder. But there was no pinned-up left sleeve – the jacket had been tailored without one. He was a tall man-six-three, Jack guessed, lean but sturdy. Well into his forties, maybe fifty. The nose was long; he wore a sculptured beard, neatly trimmed to a point at the chin. What could be seen of his mouth was wide and thin-lipped. The whites of his deep walnut eyes almost glowed in the darkness of his face, reminding Jack of John Barrymore in Svengali.

He stopped at the edge of the facing banquette and looked down at Jack, taking his measure just as Jack was taking his.

Get to know Jack better here: The Tomb

…ends in September

The Barrens

The New Jersey Pine Barrens loom large in the Secret History. It was inhabited during the First Age and the Septimus Order built one of its earliest post-cataclysmic lodges there. All sorts of strangeness is still going on there as young Jack discovered in the Teen Trilogy.

“The Barrens” is my official tribute to H. P. Lovecraft. I purposely avoided rereading any of his fiction before writing it. I wasn't out to do a slavish pastiche; I wanted to capture the Lovecraft gestalt as I remembered it. I chose the Jersey Pine Barrens because it is a truly Lovecraftian setting; all the Piney history and lore in the story are true, every locale except Razorback Hill is real. (In fact, I liked Razorback Hill so much I returned there for the backstory of Freak Show.) The style is mine, but the Cosmic Horror is Lovecraft's.

It first appeared in Lovecraft’s Legacy and wound up as a finalist for the World Fantasy Award for best novella (it lost). Wildside Press reissued it in a signed, limited hardcover edition in 1991. More recently it was revived for Arkham House's Cthulhu 2000.

Here’s the opening section. (HPL fans will recognize the opening line as a riff on his “The Thing on the Doorstep.”)

The Barrens

(sample)

1. In Search of a Devil

I shot my answering machine today. Took out the old twelve gauge my father left me, and blew it to pieces. A silly, futile gesture, I know, but it illustrates my present state of mind, I think.

And it felt good. If not for an answering machine, my life would be completely different now. I would have missed Jonathan Creighton's call. I'd be less wise but far, far happier. And I'd still have some semblance of order and meaning in my life.

He left an innocent enough message:

"'The office of Kathleen McKelston and Associates!' Sounds like Big Business! How's it going, Mac? This is Jon Creighton calling. I'm going to be in the area later this week and I'd like to see you. Lunch or dinner – whatever's better. Give me a buzz." And he left a number with a 212 area code.

So simple, so forthright, giving no hint of where it would lead.

You work your way through life day by day, learning how to play the game, carving out your niche, making a place for yourself. You have some good luck, some bad luck, sometimes you make your own luck, and along the way you begin to think that you've figured out some of the answers – not all of them, of course, but enough to make you feel that you've learned something, that you've got a handle on life and just might be able to get a decent ride out of it. You start to think you're in control. Then along comes someone like Jonathan Creighton and he smashes everything. Not just your plans, your hopes, your dreams, but everything, up to and including your sense of what is real and what is not.

I'd heard nothing from or about him since college, and had thought of him only occasionally until that day in early August when he called my office. Intrigued, I returned his call and set a date for lunch.

That was my first mistake. If I'd had the slightest inkling of where that simple lunch with an old college lover would lead, I'd have slammed down the phone and fled to Europe, or the Orient, anywhere where Jonathan Creighton wasn't.

We'd met at a freshmen mixer at Rutgers University. Maybe we each picked up subliminal cues – we called them "vibes" in those days – that told us we shared a rural upbringing. We didn't dress like it, act like it, or feel like it, but we were a couple of Jersey hicks. I came from the Pemberton area, Jon came from another rural zone, but in North Jersey, near a place called Gilead. Despite that link, we were polar opposites in most other ways. I'm still amazed we hit it off. I was career oriented while Jon was...well, he was a flake. He earned the name Crazy Creighton and he lived up to it every day. He never stayed with one thing long enough to allow anyone to pin him down. Always on to the Next New Thing before the crowd had tuned into it, always into the exotic and esoteric. Looking for the Truth, he'd say.

And as so often happens with people who are incompatible in so many ways, we found each other irresistible and fell madly in love.

Sophomore year we found an apartment off campus and moved in together. It was my first affair, and not at all a tranquil one. I read the strange books he'd find and I kept up with his strange hours, but I put my foot down when it came to the Pickman prints. There was something deeply disturbing about those paintings that went beyond their gruesome subject matter. Jon didn't fight me on it. He just smiled sadly in his condescending way, as if disappointed that I had missed the point, and rolled them up and put them away.

The thing that kept us together – at least for the year we were together – was our devotion to personal autonomy. We spent weeks of nights talking about how we had to take complete control of our own lives, and brainstorming how we were going to go about it. It seems so silly now, but that was the Sixties, and we really discussed those sorts of things back then.

We lasted sophomore year and then we fell apart. It might have gone on longer if Creighton hadn't got in with the druggies. That was the path toward loss of all autonomy as far as I was concerned, but Creighton said you can't be free until you know what's real. And if drugs might reveal the Truth, he had to try them. Which was hippie bullshit as far as I was concerned. After that, we rarely ran into each other. He wound up living alone off campus in his senior year. Somehow he managed to graduate, with a degree in anthropology, and that was the last I'd heard of him.

But that doesn't mean he hadn't left his mark.

I suppose I'm what you might call a feminist. I don't belong to NOW and I don't march in the streets, but I don't let anyone leave footprints on my back simply because I'm a woman. I believe in myself and I guess I owe some of that to Jonanthan Creighton. He always treated me as an equal. He never made an issue of it – it was simply implicit in his attitude that I was intelligent, competent, worthy of respect, able to stand on my own. It helped shape me. And I'll always revere him for that.

Lunch. I chose Rosario's on the Point Pleasant Beach side of the Manasquan Inlet, not so much for its food as for the view. Creighton was late and that didn't terribly surprise me. I didn't mind. I sipped a Chablis spritzer and watched the party boats roll in from their half-day runs of bottom fishing. Then a voice with echoes of familiarity broke through my thoughts.

"Well, Mac, I see you haven't changed much."

I turned and was shocked at what I saw. I barely recognized Creighton. He'd always been thin to the point of emaciation. Could the plump, bearded, almost cherubic figure standing before me now be–?

"Jon? Is that you?"

"The one and only," he said and spread his arms.

We embraced briefly, then took our seats in a booth by the window. As he squeezed into the far side of the table, he called the waitress over and pointed to my glass.

"Two Lites for me and another of those for her."

At first glance I'd thought that Creighton's extra poundage made him look healthy for the first time in his life. His hair was still thick and dark brown, but despite his round, rosy cheeks, his eyes were sunken and too bright. He seemed jovial but I sensed a grim undertone. I wondered if he was still into drugs.

"Almost a quarter century since we were together," he said. "Hard to believe it's been that long. The years look as if they've been kind to you."

As far as looks go, I suppose that's true. I don't dye my hair, so there's a little gray tucked in with the red. But I've always had a young face. I don't wear make-p – with my high coloring and freckles, I don't need it.

"And you."

Which wasn't actually true. His open shirt collar was frayed and looked as if this might be the third time he'd worn it since it was last washed. His tweed sport coat was worn at the elbows and a good two sizes too small for him.

We spent the drinks, appetizers, and most of the entrees catching up on each other's lives. I told him about my small accounting firm, my marriage, my recent divorce.

"No children?"

I shook my head. The marriage had gone sour, the divorce had been a nightmare. I wanted off the subject.

"But enough about me," I said. "What have you been up to?"

"Would you believe clinical psychology?"

"No," I said, too shocked to lie. "I wouldn't"

The Jonathan Creighton I'd known had been so eccentric, so out of step, so self-absorbed, I couldn't imagine him as a psychotherapist. Jonathan Creighton helping other people get their lives together – it was almost laughable.

He was the one laughing, however – good-naturedly, too.

"Yeah. It is hard to believe, but I went on to get a masters, and then a Ph.D. Actually went into practice."

His voice trailed off.

"You're using the past tense," I said.

"Right. It didn't work out. The practice never got off the ground. But the problem was really within myself. I was using a form of reality therapy but it never worked as it should. And finally I realized why: I don't know – really know – what reality is. Nobody does."

This had an all-too-familiar ring to it. I tried to lighten things up before they got too heavy.

"Didn't someone once say that reality is what trips you up whenever you walk around with your eyes closed?"

Creighton's smile showed a touch of the old condescension that so infuriated some people.

"Yes, I suppose someone would say something like that. Anyway, I decided to go off and see if I could find out what reality really was. Did a lot of traveling. Wound up in a place called Miskatonic University. Ever heard of it?"

"In Massachusetts, isn't it?"

"That's the one. In a small town called Arkham. I hooked up with the anthropology department there – that was my undergraduate major, after all. But now I've left academe to write a book."

"A book?"

This was beginning to sound like a pretty disjointed life. But that shouldn't have surprised me.

"What a deal!" he said, his eyes sparkling. "I've got grants from Rutgers, Princeton, the American Folklore Society, the New Jersey Historical Society, and half a dozen others, just to write a book!"

"What's it about?"

"The origins of folk tales. I'm going to select a few and trace them back to their roots. That's where you come in."

"Oh?"

"I'm going to devote a significant chapter to the Jersey Devil."

"There've been whole books written about the Jersey Devil. Why don't you–"

"I want real sources for this, Mac. Primary all the way. Nothing second-hand. This is going to be definitive."

"What can I do for you?"

"You're a Piney, aren't you?"

Resentment flashed through me. Even though people nowadays described themselves as "Piney" with a certain amount of pride, and I'd even seen bumper stickers touting "Piney Power," some of us still couldn't help bristling when an outsider said it. When I was a kid it was always used as a pejorative. Like "clamdigger" here on the coast. Fighting words. Officially it referred to the multigenerational natives of the great Pine Barrens that ran south from Route 70 all the way down to the lower end of the state. I've always hated the term. To me it was the equivalent of calling someone a redneck.

Which, to be honest, wasn't so far from the truth. The true Pineys are poor rural folk, often working truck farms and doing menial labor in the berry fields and cranberry bogs – a lot of them do indeed have red necks. Many are uneducated, or at best undereducated. Those who can afford wheels drive the prototypical battered pick-up with the gun rack in the rear window. They even speak with an accent that sounds southern. They're Jersey hillbillies. Country bumpkins in the very heart of the industrial Northeast. Anachronisms.

Pineys.

"Who told you that?" I said as levelly as I could.

"You did. Back in school."

"Did I?"

It shook me to see how far I'd traveled from my roots. As a scared, naive, self-deprecating frosh at Rutgers I probably had indeed referred to myself as a Piney. Now I never mentioned the word, not in reference to myself or anyone else. I was a college educated woman; I was a respected professional who spoke with a colorless northeast accent. No one in his right mind would consider me a Piney.

"Well, that was just a gag," I said. "My family roots are back in the Pine Barrens, but I am by no stretch of the imagination a Piney. So I doubt I can help you."

"Oh, but you can! The McKelston name is big in the Barrens. Everybody knows it. You've got plenty of relatives there."

"Really? How do you know?"

Suddenly he looked sheepish.

"Because I've been into the Barrens a few times now. No one will open up to me. I'm an outsider. They don't trust me. Instead of answering my questions, they play games with me. They say they don't know what I'm talking about but they know someone who might, then they send me driving in circles. I was lost out there for two solid days last month. And believe me, I was getting scared. I thought I'd never find my way out."

"You wouldn't be the first. Plenty of people, many of them experienced hunters, have gone into the Barrens and never been seen again. You'd better stay out."

His hand darted across the table and clutched mine.

"You've got to help me, Kathy. My whole future hinges on this."

I was shocked. He'd always called me "Mac." Even in bed back in our college days he'd never called me "Kathy." Gently, I pulled my hand free, saying.

"Come on, Jon–"

He leaned back and stared out the window at the circling gulls.

"If I do this right, do something really definitive, it may get me back into Miskatonic where I can finish my doctoral thesis."

I was immediately suspicious.

"I thought you said you 'left' Miskatonic, Jon. Why can't you get back in without it?"

"'Irregularities,'" he said, still not looking at me. "The old farts in the antiquities department didn't like where my research was leading me."

"This 'reality' business?"

"Yes."

"They told you that?"

Now he looked at me.

"Not in so many words, but I could tell." He leaned forward. His eyes were brighter than ever. "They've got books and manuscripts locked in huge safes there, one-of-a-kind volumes from times most scholars think of as pre-history. I managed to get a pass, a forgery that got me into the vaults. It's incredible what they have there, Mac. Incredible! I've got to get back there. Will you help me?"

His intensity was startling. And tantalizing.

"What would I have to do?"

"Just accompany me into the Pine Barrens. Just for a few trips. If I can use you as a reference, I know they'll talk to me about the Jersey Devil. After that, I can take it on my own. All I need is some straight answers from these people and I'll have my primary sources. I may be able to track a folk myth to its very roots! I'll give you credit in the book, I'll pay you, anything, Mac, just don't leave we twisting in the wind!"

He was positively frantic by the time he finished speaking.

"Easy, Jon. Easy. Let me think."

Tax season was over and I had a loose schedule for the summer. And even if I was looking ahead to a tight schedule, so what? Frankly, the job wasn't anywhere near as satisfying as it once had been. The challenge of overcoming the business community's prejudice and doubts about a woman accountant, the thrill of building a string of clients, that was all over. Everything was mostly routine now. Plus, I no longer had a husband. No children to usher toward adulthood. I had to admit that my life was pretty empty at that moment. And so was I. Why not take a little time to inspect my roots and help Crazy Creighton put his life on track, if such a thing was possible? In the bargain maybe I could gain a little perspective on my own life.

"All right, Jon," I said. "I'll do it."

Creighton's eyes lit with true pleasure, a glow distinct from the feverish intensity since he'd sat down. He thrust both his hands toward me.

"I could kiss you, Mac! I can't tell you how much this means to me! You have no idea how important this is!"

He was right about that. No idea at all.

You can find the rest of it here in my second collection, aptly titled: The Barrens and Others

October

A Day in the Life

I resurrected Repairman Jack back in a 1988 novelette that has only Jack as its connection to the Secret History. But since he’s the Heir…

One of my phone friends, Ed Gorman (with whom I've spent countless hours in conversation but have never met) called to tell me that he and Marty Greenberg were co editing an anthology called Stalkers. Would I care to contribute? I said I'd been itching to revive Repairman Jack, the lead character from The Tomb, but at less than novel length. How about a Jack story? Ed, a Repairman Jack fan since the git-go, told me I had to do it.

The Tomb had been published four years earlier. Roger Corman’s New World Pictures had optioned the novel but a combination of low-rent antics by Fred Olen Ray and a lousy screenplay (they moved the action to Pasadena!) had the project dead in the water. I dashed off a spec script in an eleventh-hour attempt to save it, but too late. Maybe just as well. The rakoshi – the Bengali temple demons who provide the horror – would have presented an almost insurmountable challenge in those pre-CGI days. How do you make them look real? The line between horror and hilarity is a couple of nanometers thick. A rakosh is scary; a guy in a rubber suit is dumb.

As I write this (2014), Beacon Films has had The Tomb in development hell for 18 years.

But back in the late 80s, the Hollywood connection provided an ulterior motive for writing a new Repairman Jack story. I had created a number of original action sequences for the Repairman Jack screenplay I’d sent to New World, and I wanted to protect them. The best way to do that was to copyright them in a story. They're all in "A Day in the Life."

And for those who care, the Tram character previously appeared in "Dat-Tay-Vao."

A Day in the Life

(sample)

When the cockroach made a right turn up the wall, Jack flipped another shuriken across the room. The steel points of the throwing star drove into the wallboard just above the bug's long antennae. It backed up and found itself hemmed in on all sides now by four of the stars.

"Did it!" Jack said from where he lay across the still made hotel bed.

He counted the shuriken protruding from the wall. A dozen of them traveled upward in a gentle arc above and behind the barely functioning TV, ending in a tiny square where the roach was trapped.

Check that. It was free again. Crawled over one of the shuriken and was now continuing on its journey to wherever. Jack let it go and rolled onto his back on the bedspread.

Bored.

And hot. He was dressed in jeans and a loose, heavy sweater under an oversized lightweight jacket, both dark blue; a black-and-orange knitted cap was jammed on the top of his head. He'd turned the thermostat all the way down but the room remained an oven. He didn't want to risk taking anything off because, when the buzzer sounded, he had to hit the ground running.

He glanced over at the dusty end table where the little Walkman sized box with the antenna sat in silence.

"Come on, already," he mumbled to it. "Let's do it."

Reilly and his sleazos were due to make their move tonight. What was taking them so long to get started? Almost one a.m. already – three hours here in this fleabag. He was starting to itch. He could handle only so much TV without getting drowsy. Even without the lulling drone of some host interviewing some actor he'd never heard of, the heat was draining him.

Fresh air. Maybe that would help.

Jack got up, stretched, and stepped to the window. A clear almost Halloween night out there, with a big moon rising over the city. He gripped the handles and pulled. Nothing. The damn thing wouldn't budge. He was checking the edges of the sash when he heard the faint crack of a rifle. The bullet came through the glass two inches to the left of his head, peppering his face with tiny sharp fragments as it whistled past his ear.

Jack dropped to the floor. He waited. No more shots. Keeping his head below the level of the windowsill, he rose to a crouch, then leapt for the lamp on the end table at the far side of the bed, grabbed it, and rolled to the floor with it. Another shot spat through the glass and whistled through the room as his back thudded against the floor. He turned off the lamp.

The other lamp, the one next to the TV, was still on – sixty watts of help for the shooter. And whoever was shooting had to know Jack would be going for it next. He'd be ready.

On his belly, Jack slid along the industrial grade carpet toward the end of the bed until he had an angle where the bulb was visible under the shade. He pulled out his next to last shuriken and spun it toward the bulb. With an electric pop it flared blue white and left the room dark except for the flickering glow from the TV.

Immediately Jack popped his head above the bed and looked out the window. Through the spider webbed glass he caught sight of a bundled figure turning and darting away across the neighboring rooftop. Moonlight glinted off the long barrel of a high powered rifle, flashed off the lens of a telescopic sight, then he was gone.

A high pitched beep made him jump. The red light on the signal box was blinking like mad. Kuropolis wanted help. Which meant Reilly had struck.

"Swell."

*

Not a bad night, George Kuropolis thought, wiping down the counter in front of the slim young brunette as she seated herself. Not a great night, but still to have half a dozen customers at this hour was good. And better yet, Reilly and his creeps hadn't shown up.

Maybe they'd bother somebody else tonight.

"What'll it be?" he asked the brunette.

"Tea, please," she said with a smile. A nice smile. She was dressed nice and had decent jewelry on. Not exactly overdressed for the neighborhood, but better than the usual.

George wished he had more customers of her caliber. And he should have them. Why the hell not? Didn't the chrome inside and out sparkle? Couldn't you eat off the floor? Wasn't everything he served made right here on the premises?

"Sure. Want some pie?"

"No, thank you."

"It's good. Blueberry. Made it myself."

The smile again. "No, thanks. I'm on a diet."

"Sure," he mumbled as he turned away to get her some hot water. "Everyone's on a goddamn diet. Diets are gettin' hazardous to my health."

Just then the front door burst open and a white haired man in his mid twenties leaped in with a sawed off shotgun in his hands. He pointed it at the ceiling and let loose a round at the fixture over the cash register. The boom of the blast was deafening as glass showered everything.

Matt Reilly was here.

Four more of his gang crowded in behind him. George recognized them: Reece was the black with the white fringe leather jacket; Rafe had the blue Mohican, Tony had the white; and Cheeks was the baby faced skinhead.

"Awright!" Reilly said, grinning fiercely under his bent nose, mean little eyes, dark brows, and bleached crewcut. "It's ass kickin' time!"

George reached into his pocket and pressed the button on the beeper there, then raised his hands and backed up against the wall.

"Hey, Matt!" he called. "C'mon! What's the problem?"

"You know the problem, George!" Reilly said.

He tossed the shotgun to Reece and stepped around the counter. Smiling, he closed with George. The smile only heightened the sick knot of fear coiling in George's belly. He was so fixed on that empty smile that he didn't see the sucker punch coming. It caught him in the gut. He doubled over in agony. His last cup of coffee heaved but stayed down.

He groaned. "Christ!"

"You're late again, George!" Reilly said through his teeth. "I told you last time what would happen if you didn't stick to the schedule!"

George struggled to remember his lines.

"I can't pay two protections! I can't afford it!"

"You can't afford not to afford it! And you don't have to pay two. Just pay me!"

"Sure! That's what the other guy says when he wants his! And where are you then?"

"Don't worry about the other guy! I'm taking care of him tonight! But you!" Reilly rammed George back against the wall. "I'm gonna hafta make a example outta you, George! People saw what happened to Wolansky when he turned pigeon. Now they're gonna see what happens to a shit who don't pay!"

Just then came a scream from off to George's right. He looked and saw Reece covering the five male customers in booths two and four, making them empty their pockets onto one of the tables. Further down the counter, Cheeks was waving a big knife with a mean looking curved blade at the girl who'd wanted the tea.

"The ring, babe," he was saying. "Let's have it."

"It's my engagement ring!" she said.

"You wanna look nice at your wedding, you better give it quick."

He reached for it and she slapped his hand away.

"No!"

Cheeks straightened up and slipped the knife into a sheath tucked into the small of his back.

"Ooooh, you shouldna done that, bitch," said Reece in oily tones.

George wished he were a twenty five year old with a Schwartzenegger build instead of a wheezy fifty with pencil arms. He'd wipe the floor with these creeps.

"Stop him," he said to Reilly. "Please. I'll pay you."

"Couldn't stop him now if I wanted to," Reilly said, grinning. "Cheeks likes it when they play rough."

In a single smooth motion, the skinhead's hand snaked out, grabbed the front of the woman's blouse, and ripped. The whole front came away. Her breasts were visible through a semi transparent bra. She screamed and swatted at him. Cheeks shrugged off the blow and grappled with her, dragging her to the floor.

One of the men in the booth near Reece leapt to his feet and started toward the pair, yelling, "Hey! Whatta y'think you're doin'?"

Reece slammed the shotgun barrel across his face. Blood spurted from the guy's forehead as he dropped back into his seat.

"Tony!" Reilly said to the Mohican standing by the cash register. "Where's Rafe?"

"Inna back."

George suddenly felt his scalp turn to fire as Reilly grabbed him by the hair and shoved him toward Tony.

"Take George in the back. You and Rafe give him some memory lessons so he won't be late again."

George felt his sphincters loosening. Where was Jack?

"I'll pay! I told you I'll pay!"

"It's not the same, George," Reilly said with a slow shake of his head. "If I gotta come here and kick ass every month just to get what's mine, well, I got better things to do, y'know?"

As George watched, Reilly hit the "NO SALE" button on the cash register and started digging into the bills.

Thick, pincer like fingers closed on the back of George's neck as he was propelled into the rear of the diner. He saw Rafe off to the side, playing with the electric meat grinder where George mixed his homemade sausage.

"Rafe!" said Tony. "Matt wants us to teach Mr. Greasyspoon some manners!"

Rafe didn't look up. He had a raw chicken leg in his hand. He shoved it into the top of the meat grinder. The sickening crunch of bone and cartilage being pulverized rose over the whir of the motor, then ground chicken leg began to extrude through the grate at the bottom.

"Hey, Tone!" Rafe said, looking up and grinning. "I got a great idea!"

*

Jack pounded along the second floor hallway. He double timed down the flight of stairs to the lobby, sprinted across the carpet tiles that spelled out "The Lucky Hotel" in bright yellow on dark blue, and pushed through the smudged glass doors of the entrance. One of the letters on the neon sign above the door was out. The ucky Hotel flashed fitfully in hot red.

Jack leaped down the three front steps and hit the pavement running. Half a block to the left, then another left down an alley, leaping puddles and dodging garbage cans until he came to the rear of the Highwater Diner. He had his key ready and shoved it into the deadbolt on the delivery door. He paused there long enough to draw his .45 automatic, a Colt Mark IV, and to stretch the knitted cap down over his face. It then became a Halloween decorated ski mask, and he was looking out through a bright orange jack o lantern. He pulled the door open and slipped into the storage area at the rear of the kitchen.

Up ahead he heard the sound of a scuffle, and George's terrified voice crying, "No, don't! Please don't!"

He rounded the corner of the meat locker and found Tony and Rafe – he'd know those Mohicans anywhere – from Reilly's gang forcing George's hand into a meat grinder and George struggling like all hell to keep it out. But he was losing the battle. His fingers would soon be sausage meat.

Jack was just reaching for the slide on his automatic when he spotted a meat-tenderizing hammer on a nearby counter. He picked it up and hefted it. Heavy – a good three pounds, most of it in the steel head. Pocketing the pistol, he stepped over to the trio and began a sidearm swing toward Tony's skull.

"Tony! Trick or treat!"

Tony looked up just in time to stop the full weight of the waffle-faced hammer head with the center of his face. It made a noise like smoonch! as it buried itself in his nose. He was halfway to the floor before Rafe even noticed.

"Tone?"

Jack didn't wait for him to look up. He used the hammer to crunch a wide part in the center of Rafe's blue Mohican. Rafe joined Tony on the floor.

"God, am I glad to see you!" George said, gasping and fondling his fingers as if to reassure himself that they were all there. "What took you so long?"

"Can't've been more than two minutes," Jack said, slipping the handle of the hammer through his belt and pulling the automatic again.

"Seemed like a year!"

"The rest of them out front?"

"Just three – Reilly, the skinhead, and Reece."

Jack paused. "Where's the rest of them?"

"Don't know."

Jack thought he knew. The other three had probably been on that rooftop trying to plug him in his hotel room. But how had they found him? He hadn't even told George about staying at the Lucky.

One way to find out...

"Okay. You lock the back door and stay here. I'll take care of the rest."

"There's a girl out there–" George said.

Jack nodded. "I'm on my way."

He turned and almost bumped into Reilly coming through the swinging doors from the front. He was counting the fistful of cash in his hands.

"How we doin' back–?" Reilly said and then froze when the muzzle of Jack's automatic jammed up under his chin.

"Happy Halloween," Jack said.

"Shit! You again!"

"Right, Matt, old boy. Me again. And I see you've made my collection for me. How thoughtful. You can shove it in my left pocket."

Reilly's face was white with rage as he glanced over to where Tony writhed on the floor next to the unconscious Rafe.

"You're a dead man, pal. Worse than dead!"

Jack smiled through the ski mask and increased the pressure of the barrel on Reilly's throat.

"Just do as you're told."

"What's with you and these masks, anyway?" he said as he stuffed the money into Jack's pocket. "You that ugly? Or do you think you're Spiderman or something?"

"No, I'm Pumpkinman. And this way I know you but you don't know me. You see, Matt, I've been keeping close tabs on you. I know all your haunts. I stand in plain view and watch you. I've watched you play pool at Gus's. I've walked up behind you in a crowd and bumped you as I passed. I could have slipped an ice pick between your ribs a dozen times by now. But don't try to spot me. You won't. While you're trying to hard to look like Billy Idol, I'm trying even harder to look like nobody."

"You are nobody, man!" His voice was as tough as ever, but a haunted look had crept into his eyes.

Jack laughed. "Surprised to see me?"

"Not really," Reilly said, recovering. "I figured you'd show up."

"Yeah? What's the matter? No faith in your hit squad?"

"Hit squad?" There was genuine bafflement in his eyes. "What the fuck you talkin' about?"

Jack sensed that Reilly wasn't faking it. He was as baffled as Jack.

He let his mind wander an instant. If not Reilly's bunch, then who?

No time for that now. Especially with the muffled screams coming from the front. He turned Reilly around and shoved him back through the swinging doors to the front of the diner. Once there, he bellied Reilly up against the counter and put the .45 to his temple. He saw Reece covering half a dozen customers with a sawed off shotgun. But where was that psycho, Cheeks?

"Okay, turkeys!" Jack yelled. "Fun's over! Drop the hardware!"

Reece spun and faced them. His eyes widened and he raised the scattergun in their direction. Jack felt Reilly cringe back against him.

"Go ahead," Jack said, placing himself almost completely behind Reilly. "You can't make him any uglier."

"Don't, man!" Reilly said in a low voice.

Reece didn't move. He didn't seem to know what to do. So Jack told him.

"Put the piece on the counter or I'll blow his head off."

"No way," Reece said.

"Don't try me, pal. I'll do it just for fun."

Jack hoped Reece didn't think he was bluffing, because he wasn't. He'd already been shot at twice tonight and he was in a foul mood.

"Do what he says, man," Reilly told him.

"No way!" Reece said. "I'll get outta here, but no way I'm givin' that suckuh my piece!"

Jack wasn't going to allow that. As soon as Reece got outside he'd start peppering the big windows with shot. He was about to move Reilly out from behind the counter to block the aisle when one of the customers Reece had been covering stood up behind him and grabbed the pump handle of the scattergun. A second man leapt to his side to help. One round blasted into the ceiling, and then the gun was useless – with all those hands on it, Reece couldn't pump another round into the chamber. Two more customers jumped up and overpowered him. The shotgun came free as a fifth man with a deep cut in his forehead shoved Reece back onto the seat of the booth and began pounding at his face. More fists began to fly. These were very angry men.

Jack guided Reilly toward the group. He saw two pairs of legs – male and female, struggling on the floor around the far end of the counter. He shoved Reilly toward the cluster of male customers.

"Here's another one for you. Have fun. Just don't do anything to them they wouldn't do to you."

Two of the men smiled and slammed Reilly down face first on the booth's table. They began pummeling his kidneys as Jack hurried down to where Cheeks was doing his dirty work.

He looked over the edge of the counter and saw that the skinhead held the woman's arms pinned between them with his left hand and had his right thrust up under her bra, twisting her nipple, oblivious to everything else. Her right eye was bruised and swollen. She was crying and writhing under him, even snapping at him with her teeth. A real fighter. She must have put up quite a struggle. Cheeks's face was bleeding from several scratches.

Jack was tempted to put a slug into the base of Cheeks's spine so he'd not only never walk again, he'd never get it up again, either. But Cheeks's knife was in the way, and besides, the bullet might pass right through him and into the woman. So he pocketed the .45, grabbed Cheeks's right ear, and ripped upward.

Cheeks came off the floor with a howl. Jack lifted him by the ear and stretched his upper body across the counter. He could barely speak. He really wanted to hurt this son of a bitch.

"Naughty, naughty!" he managed to say. "Didn't you ever go to Catholic school? Didn't the nuns tell you that bad things would happen to you if you ever did that to a girl?"

He stretched the guy's right hand out on the counter, palm down.

"Like you might get warts?"

He pulled the meat hammer from his belt and raised it over his head.

"Or worse?"

He put everything he had into the shot. Bones crunched like breadsticks. Cheeks screamed and slipped off the counter. He rolled on the floor, moaning and crying, cradling his injured hand like a mother with a newborn baby.

"Never hassle a paying customer," Jack said. "George can't pay his protection without them."

He grabbed Reece's scattergun and pulled him and Reilly free from the customers. Both were battered and bloody. He shoved them toward the front door.

"I told you clowns about trying to cut in on my turf! How many times we have to do this dance?"

Reilly whirled on him, rage in his eyes. He probably would have leapt at Jack's throat if not for the shotgun.

"We was here first, asshole!"

"Maybe. But I'm here now, so scrape up your two wimps from the back room and get them out of here."

He oversaw the pair as they dragged Rafe and Tony out the front door. Cheeks was on his feet by then. Jack waved him forward.

"C'mon, loverboy. Party's over."

"He's got my ring!" the brunette cried from the far end of the counter. She held her torn dress up over her breasts. There was blood at the corner of her mouth. "My engagement ring."

"Really?" Jack said. "That ought to be worth something! Let's see it."

Cheeks glared at Jack and reached into his back pocket with his good hand.

"You wanna see it?" he said. Suddenly he was swinging a big Gurkha kukri knife through the air, slashing at Jack's eyes. "Here! Get a close look!"

Jack blocked the curved blade with the short barrel of the sawed off, then grabbed Cheeks's wrist and twisted. As Cheeks instinctively brought his broken hand up, Jack dropped the shotgun. He grabbed the injured hand and squeezed. Cheeks screamed and went to his knees.

"Drop the blade," Jack said softly.

It clattered to the counter.

"Good. Now find that ring and put it on the counter."

Cheeks dug into the left front pocket of his jeans and pulled out a tiny diamond on a gold band. Jack's throat tightened when he saw the light in the brunette's eyes at the sight of it. Such a little thing... yet so important.

Still gripping Cheeks's crushed hand, he picked up the ring and pretended to examine it.

"You went to all that trouble for this itty bitty thing?" Jack slid it down the counter. "Here, babe. Compliments of the house."

She had to let the front of her dress drop to grab it. She clutched the tiny ring against her with both hands and began to cry. Jack felt the black fury crowd the edges of his vision. He looked at Cheeks's round baby face, glaring up at him from seat level by the counter top, and picked up the kukri. He held it before Cheeks's eyes. The pupils dilated with terror.

Releasing the broken hand, Jack immediately grabbed Cheek's throat and jaw, twisted him up and around, and slammed the back of his head down on the counter, pinning him there. With two quick strokes he carved a crude "X" in the center of Cheeks's forehead. He howled and Jack let go. He grabbed the shotgun again and shoved Cheeks toward the door.

"Don't worry, Cheeks. It's nothing embarrassing – just your signature."

You can find the rest of the story in either: The Barrens and Others or Quick Fixes – Tales of Repairman Jack

November

The Long Way Home

Toward the end of May, 1990, Joe Lansdale called, looking for a story for Dark at Heart, an anthology he was editing with his wife Karen. He wanted it dark but without any supernatural. I suggested a New York mean-streets story starring Jack. He loved the idea. “The Long Way Home” was the result. I started it in late May but due to a crowded plate, didn’t finish it until the end of July.

Fifteen years later my agent contacted me about Amazon Shorts, a new feature at Amazon.com that would allow readers to download a short story for a nominal fee. Could I write something for them?

Nope. Too much on my plate at the time to cranks out something new. But I did have a long-lost Repairman Jack piece called “The Long Way Home” from Joe and Karen’s four-hundred-copy anthology that hadn’t been seen since 1992. I showed them that.

On the morning of May 11, Amazon, adamant about no previously published material, rejected it. By afternoon they’d reversed themselves. I was told that Jeff Bezos himself had said to screw the technicality in this case.

So I revised the story to bring it into the twenty-first century and sent it in. Amazon Shorts launched in August. “The Long Way Home” became the second most downloaded piece (and the #1 fiction download) during the program's first eighteen months.

(NB: Jack doesn’t drink Rolling Rock anymore.)

The story begins with Jack’s worst nightmare: He’s arrested…

The Long Way Home

1

Jack saw the whole thing. Another minute’s delay in leaving for home and he’d have been a block away when it went down. And then a different man would have died on the pavement.

But Julio had held him up, detailing his current bitch about all the yuppies chasing out his tavern’s regular customers. He was especially irate about one who’d offered to buy the place.

“You believe that?” Julio was saying. “He wanna turn it into a bistro, meng. A bistro!”

An incomprehensible stream of Puerto Rican followed. Which meant Julio was royally pissed. He was proud of his command of English and only under extreme provocation did he revert to his native tongue.

“He was only asking. What’s wrong with that?”

“Because he offer me a lot of money, meng. I mean a lot of money.”

“How much?”

Julio whispered it in Jack’s ear.

Right: A lot of money.

“I repeat: What’s wrong with that? You should be proud.”

“I don’ know ‘bout proud, but I was tempted to take it.”

“No!” Jack said, genuinely shaken. “Don’t say that, Julio. Don’t even think it.”

“I couldn’t help it. But I tol’ him to get lost. I mean, I like money much as the next guy, meng, but I only risk so much for it.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder at the motley collection of scruffy locals leaning on the bar behind him. “You know what those guys do to me if I sol’ out to a yuppie? Have to run for my life.”

“You may still have to if Maria finds out how much you turned down.”

“Don’ tell her. Don’ breathe a word, Jack.”

“Your secret’s safe with me.”

Jack left with his cold six-pack of Rolling Rock long necks and turned the corner onto Amsterdam Avenue, heading downtown. Quiet on the Upper West Side tonight. A lot of the restaurants were closed on Mondays and it was too cold for a casual stroll. Jack had the street pretty much to himself.

Gentrification had slowed in these parts – mainly because everything had been pretty well gentrified – and was seeping into Harlem and even Morningside Heights. This neighborhood, once ethnically and socioeconomically mixed, had homogenized into an all-white, upper-income enclave; neighborhood taverns had metamorphosed into brasseries and bistros, mom-and-pop grocery stores and bodegas into gourmet delis, sidewalk cafés, overpriced boutiques and shoppes – always spelled with the extra “-pe.” Rents had taken up residency in Mir’s old orbit.

At the next corner Jack spotted a blue-and-white parked by the fire hydrant in front of Costin’s. His first instinct was to turn and walk the other way, but that might draw attention.

He checked himself out in his mental mirror: average-length brown hair, NY Jets warm up jacket over a flannel shirt, worn jeans over dirty white sneakers. Just an average Joe. Virtually invisible.

So he stayed on course.

Waiting on the curb for a car to pass, he did a quick scan of the scene. Quiet. Only one cop in the unit, in the passenger seat, looking relaxed. His partner was stepping into Costin’s. The light filtering through the open door revealed a very young-looking cop. Baby-faced. Probably picking up some donut-shaped teething biscuits.

Costin’s had been there forever – a Paleolithic prototype of the convenience store. Now it was one of the last mom-and-pops in the area. Old Costin had to stay open all hours just to meet the rent. The locals left over from the old days remained loyal, and most of the cops from the Two-oh stopped in regularly to help keep them going.

Jack was halfway across the street when he heard a boom. He knew that sound. Shotgun. Instinctively he ducked behind the nearest parked car on the far side. The sound had been muffled. An indoor shot.

Shit. Costin’s.

He set the six-pack down and peeked over the hood. The cop was out of the unit’s passenger seat now and on the sidewalk, drawing his pistol. Just then the door to Costin’s burst open and a giant leapt onto the top step. He stood six-six at least and looked completely bald under the flat black leather cap squeezed onto the top of his head; the loose sweatsuit he wore only emphasized his massive, bulked-up frame. He was snarling, his shiny black features contorted in rage. He held a sawed-off ten-gauge pump-action against his hip, aimed down at the cop.

In the clear air, lit by the mercury vapor lamps lining the block, the scene had an unreal look, like something out of a movie.

The cop raised his pistol, giving warning, going by the book.

“Drop it or I’ll–”

He never got to finish the sentence. The big guy barely blinked as he pulled the trigger.

The left side of the cop’s face and neck exploded red. His pistol flew from his hand as he was spun to his left to land face down on the hood of the unit. He left a wet, red smear as he slid across the hood. He rolled over the grille and landed on the asphalt in front of the bumper, flat on his back, twitching.

The big black guy’s face changed as soon as the cop went down. The snarl melted into a smile, but the rage remained, hiding behind the teeth he showed. Casually laying the shotgun across his shoulder, he approached the cop like a gardener strolling toward a cabbage patch with his hoe.

“Well, Mr. Man in Blue,” he said, standing over the moaning cop. “How’s it feel to bleed?”

The cop couldn’t speak. Even from down the street Jack could see the blood pumping from his neck. Another sixty seconds and he’d be history.

Jack found himself on the move before he knew it, his sneakers whispering along the pavement as he raced down the sidewalk in a crouch, watching the scene through the windows of the parked cars he kept between himself and the other side of the street.

A voice inside urged him the other way. Cops were the enemy, a threat to his own existence.

This isn’t your fight – butt out.

But another, deeper part of him overruled the voice and made him pull the Semmerling from his ankle holster. Still in a crouch, he started across the street.

“You know,” the big black was saying, “I could let you bleed some more and make a bigger puddle, and pretty soon you’d be just as dead as if I blowed your head off.” He grinned as he worked the pump on the sawed-off. A red-and-brass cartridge arced into the street. “But somehow that wouldn’t be the same.”

He leveled the truncated barrel into the cop’s face.

“Forget it,” Jack said as he came up behind him. He had the Semmerling pointed at the back of the guy’s head. “You’ve done enough for one night.”

The guy glanced over his shoulder. When his eyes lit on the Semmerling, he smiled.

“Ain’t never been threatened with a pop gun before.”

“Just drop the hog and take off.”

“You mean you ain’t gonna arrest me?”

Jack had acted on impulse. At the moment, the best course seemed to be get rid of the shooter and call an ambulance for the cop. Then disappear.

“One more time. Drop it and go.”

The guy’s voice jumped. “You kiddin’ me, man? I could take a couple from that pop gun and sit down for breakfast.”

“It’s a Semmerling LM-4,” Jack said. “World’s smallest forty-five.”

The gunman paused.

“Oh. Well, in that case–”

The guy ducked to his right as he made a hard swing with the shotgun, trying to bring it to bear on Jack. Jack corrected his aim and pulled the trigger. The Semmerling boomed and bucked in his hand. The gunman’s right eye socket became a black hole and his leather cap spun away like a Frisbee. Red mist haloed his head as it jerked back with enough force to yank his feet off the pavement. The sawed-off tumbled from his hand and skittered along the sidewalk as he sprawled back on the sidewalk and flopped around until his body got the message that what little remained of the brain was mush. Then he lay still.

Jack knelt beside the fallen cop. He looked like hell. The mercury light further blanched the deathly pallor of his face. Eyes glazing, going fast. Where the hell was old man Costin? Where was the cop’s partner? Why wasn’t anyone around to call an ambulance? Jack felt naked and exposed out here on the street, but he couldn’t take off now.

He switched the Semmerling to his left hand, located the spot in the fallen cop’s throat that was doing the most pumping, and jammed his thumb into it. The flesh was wet and hot and sticky. He’d read novel after novel that mentioned the coppery smell of blood. He didn’t get it. He’d never known copper to have an odor worth mentioning, and if it did, it sure as hell didn’t smell like this.

Jack was about to look around again for help when he heard footsteps behind him.

“All right! Hold it right there, you fucker!”

Jack turned his head and saw a uniformed cop crouched on his right, taking two-handed aim at his head with a Glock. Another blue-and-white blocked the street behind him.

Jack’s gut looped into a knot and pulled tight.

“I’m holding it.”

“Drop the gun and put your hands up!”

Jack dropped the Semmerling and raised his left hand.

“C’mon!” The cop said. “Both of them!”

“This guy’s already half dead,” Jack said. “If I take my hand off this pumper, he’ll go the rest of the way in no time.”

“Christ!” the cop said, then shouted: “Gerry – you make the call?”

“Ambulance and back-up on the way,” said a voice from the unit.

“All right. See who’s down.”

Another uniform dashed out of the darkness behind the first cop and stopped within half a dozen feet of Jack. He squinted at the ruined face above Jack’s hand.

“Oh, Jeez, it’s Carella!”

“Shit!” said the first cop. He spoke through clenched teeth as he glared at Jack. “You dirty–”

“Hey-hey!” Jack said. “Let’s get something straight here. I didn’t shoot your pal.”

“Just shut the fuck up! You think I’m stupid?”

Jack bit back an affirmative and jerked his head toward the guy on the sidewalk.

“He did it.”

Apparently the cop hadn’t seen the other body until now. He jumped to his feet.

“Oh, great. Just great.”

The second cop, the one called Gerry, eased around to the sidewalk and checked out the body.

“This one’s cooling,” he said. “Head wound.” He whistled. “Looks like a hot load.”

“And I suppose you had nothing to do with that, either?” the first cop said.

“No. Him I did. But there was another cop. He went into Costin’s. I heard a shot, and then this guy–”

“Jeez!” Gerry said. “The kid was with Carella!”

“See if he’s all right!” the first cop said.

Gerry dashed up the stairs and grabbed the door handle. As he pulled it open, a voice screamed from within.

“Stay back! I got your buddy and the owner in here! Stay back or I’ll kill ‘em both!”

Gerry scuttled back down the steps.

“We got a hostage situation here, Fred.”

“He’s got the kid!” Fred said. “God damn! Call the hostage team. Now!”

As Gerry ran off, an emergency rig howled down the street and screeched to a halt. Jack explained to the EMTs what had happened and why he had his thumb sunk an inch into the wounded man’s neck. One of the techs pulled on a rubber glove and substituted his finger for Jack’s. He held it there as the wounded cop was lifted onto a stretcher.

Jack watched for a second, then began to edge backward, preparing to slide between two parked cars.

“No, you don’t!” Fred the cop said, jerking his pistol up level with Jack’s head. “You ain’t goin’ nowhere! Hands on the car and spread ‘em!”

Desperation gnawed on Jack’s spine as his eyes hunted for an escape route. The street crawled with uniforms, and they all seemed to be watching him. Slowly he forced his lead-filled limbs to move, slapping his hands against the hood of the patrol car, spreading his feet. He held up okay during the frisk, but he almost lost it when his hands were yanked behind his back and the cuffs squeezed around his wrists.

Cops, arrest, cuffs, interrogation, investigation, fingerprinting, exposure, court, lawyers, judges, jail – a recurrent nightmare for most of his adult life.

Tonight it was real.

The rest of the story continues in… Quick Fixes – Tales of Repairman Jack

December

LEGACIES

After a 14-year holdout, I finally gave in and wrote a sequel to The Tomb.

I’ve always been a genre hopper: SF in the 70s, horror in the 80s, medical thrillers in the 90s. In the mid-90s I signed a multi-book contract for medical thrillers. The Select and Implant had been fun but I was finding the genre confining and losing interest. I submitted Deep as the Marrow as part of the contract, but it was really a political thriller with a doctor as protagonist. The next novel I wanted to write was a techy thriller with no medical elements. In fact, it looked perfect for bringing back Repairman Jack. Just once… just this once. But the contract called for a medical thriller.

I decided what the hell. I tipped my hat to the contract by having a doctor hire Jack. (“It’s got a doctor and it’s a thriller – that makes it a medical thriller, yo.”) The publisher wasn’t fooled for a moment, but they liked the novel and Legacies was published in 1998. I had so much fun with Jack that I decided to do one (just one) more. That was Conspiracies. By then I was hooked. So I gave in.

Eventually I came to realize that this series was the answer to my genre-hopping dilemma. I can do a conspiracy novel, a medical thriller, a high-tech thriller, a haunted house story... I can do any kind of novel I feel like writing. As long as Repairman Jack’s in it, the marketing department’s happy, the readers are happy, and I’m happy. What had seemed like a trap turned out to be liberating.

Legacies danced along the borders of Tesla territory but had no supernatural elements. The events of The Tomb are alluded to (Jack has scars) but play no part in the story. You could start the series with Legacies and go back to The Tomb later (as long as you read it before All the Rage).

One impetus for bringing Jack back was a news story about the theft of a load of Christmas toys being put aside for children with AIDS. It infuriated me. I wanted to get even with that guy soooo bad. So I sicced Jack on him…

LEGACIES

(sample)

FRIDAY

1

“It’s okay!” Alicia shouted from the rear seat as the cab jerked to the left to swing around a NYNEX truck plodding up Madison Avenue. “I’m not in a rush!”

The driver – curly dark hair, a thick mustache, and swarthy skin – didn’t seem to hear. He jogged his machine two lanes left, then three lanes right, hitting the brakes and gunning the engine, hitting and gunning, jerking Alicia back and forth, left and right, then swerving to avoid another yellow maniacmobile trying a similar move through the morning traffic.

Her cab’s net gain: one car length. Maybe.

Alicia rapped on the smudged, scratched surface of the plastic divider. “Slow down, dammit! I want to arrive in one piece.”

But the driver ignored her. If anything, he upped his speed. He seemed to be engaged in a private war against every other car in Manhattan. And God help you if you were a pedestrian.

Alicia should have been used to this. She’d grown up in Manhattan. She hadn’t been here for a while, though. She’d moved away at eighteen for college and had stayed away for medical school and her residencies in pediatrics and infectious diseases. She hadn’t wanted to come back – what with that man and her half-brother Thomas still living here – but St. Vincent’s had made her the proverbial offer she couldn’t refuse.

So now, after a little over a year, she was still getting used to the city’s changes. Who’d have believed they’d be able to scour off the grim sleaziness that she’d assumed to be permanently etched on Times Square?

Cabbies too. What had happened to them? They’d always been pushy, brazen drivers – you had to be to get around in this city – but this new crop was maniacal.

Finally they hit the Forties.

Almost there, Alicia thought. Maybe I’ll live to see another sunset after all.

But as they neared 48th she noticed her cab was still in the center lane, accelerating. At first she thought he was going to miss her turn off, then she saw the opening: two lanes to the right, behind a graffiti-coated delivery truck and just ahead of a bus pulling away from the curb.

“You’re not!” Alicia cried. “Please tell me you’re not going to try to–”

He did. And he made it – just barely – but not without forcing the bus to slam on its brakes and give him a deafening blast from its horn.

The cabby floored it along the open stretch of 48th, then swerved violently rightward toward the curb, jerking to a halt at the address Alicia had given him when she’d slid into its rear seat down in Greenwich Village.

“Six-seventy-five,” he said.

Alicia sat there fuming, wishing she were strong enough to break through the partition and throttle him. She wasn’t. But she could give him a taste of his own medicine – in reverse.

Slowly, she inched toward the curbside door, opened it with the greatest of care, and edged herself out into the chill December air. Then she took out her wallet and began to count her change… carefully. She had about two dollars worth. She picked out a dollar-seventy-five in dimes and nickels.

“Come on, lady,” the cabby said, leaning over the passenger seat and looking up at her through the window. “I have not all day.”

Alicia made no sign she’d heard him as she slowly pulled five singles from her wallet, one… at… a… time. Finally, when she had exactly six-seventy-five in her hand, she handed it through the window.

And waited.

It didn’t take long – three seconds, tops – before the driver popped out his door and glared at her over the roof.

“Ay! Where is tip?” He pronounced it teep.

“Pardon me?” Alicia said sweetly. “I can’t hear you.”

“My tip, lady! Where is it?”

“I’m sorry,” she said, holding a hand to her ear. “Your lips appear to be moving, but I can’t hear a word you’re saying. Something about my slip?”

“My tip, goddammit! My tip! My tip! My fucking tip!”

“Did I enjoy my trip?” she said, then let her voice go icy. “On a scale of one to ten, I enjoyed it zero… exactly the amount of your tip.”

He made a move to come around the cab, probably figuring he could intimidate this slight, pale woman with the fine features and the glossy black hair, but Alicia held her ground. He gave her a venomous look and slipped back into his seat.

As she turned away, she heard the cabby shout an inarticulate curse, slam his door, and burn rubber as he tore off.

We’re even, she thought, her anger fading. But what an awful way to start a beautiful fall day.

She put it behind her. She’d been looking forward to this meeting with Leo Weinstein and wasn’t going to let some crazy cabby upset her.

At last she’d found an attorney who wasn’t afraid to tackle a big law firm. All of the others she’d tried – those in her limited price range – had reacted with a little too much awe when they’d heard the name Hinchberger, Rainey & Guran. Not Weinstein. Hadn’t fazed him in the least. He’d read through the will and within a day came up with half a dozen suggestions he seemed to believe would put the big boys on the defensive.

“Your father left you that house,” he’d said. “No way they can keep it from you. Just leave it to me.”

And so she’d done just that. Now she was going to see what he’d accomplished with the blizzard of paper he’d fired at HR&G.

She heard a honk behind her and stiffened. If it was that cab…

She turned and relaxed as she saw Leo Weinstein waving through the open window of a silver Lexus. He was saying something she couldn’t catch. She stepped closer.

“Good morning,” she said.

“Sorry I’m late,” he said. “The LIE was jammed. Just let me pull into the garage down there and I’ll be right with you.”

“No problem.”

She was almost to the front door of the building where Cutter and Weinstein had their offices when she was staggered by a thunderous noise. The shock wave slammed against her back like a giant hand and almost knocked her off her feet.

Turning she saw a ball of flame racing skyward from the middle of the block, and flaming pieces of metal crashing to the ground all about her. Cars were screeching to a halt as pedestrians dove for the pavement amid glittering shards of glass tumbling from windows up and down the block. Alicia jumped back as a blackened, smoking chunk of a car trunk lid landed in front of her and rolled to her feet.

An icy coil of horror tightened around her throat as she recognized the Lexus insignia.

She craned her neck to look for Leo’s car, but it was… gone.

“Oh, no! Oh, my God, no!”

She hurried forward a few steps on wobbly knees to see if there was anything she could do, but… the car… nothing was left where it had been… just burning asphalt.

“Oh, God, Leo! Oh, I’m so sorry!”

She couldn’t breathe. What had happened to all the air? She had to get away from here.

She forced her stricken body to turn and blunder back up the sidewalk, away from the smoke, the flames, the wreckage. She stopped when she reached Madison Avenue. She leaned against a traffic light post and gulped air. When she’d caught her breath, she looked back.

Already the human vultures were gathering, streaming toward the flames, wondering what happened. And not too far away, sirens.

She couldn’t stay here. She couldn’t help Weinstein and she didn’t want to be listed as a witness. The police might get it into their heads that she was hiding something, and they might start looking into her background, her family. She couldn’t allow that. Couldn’t stand it.

Alicia didn’t look for a taxi – the thought of being confined was unbearable. She needed space, light, air. She turned downtown.

Poor Leo!

She sobbed as she started walking, moving as fast as her low-heeled shoes would allow. But even if she’d worn her sneakers she would not have been able to outrun the guilt, the terrible suspicion that she was somehow responsible for Leo Weinstein’s death.

2

“Thank God you’re here!” Raymond said as Alicia walked though the Center’s employee entrance. “I’ve been beeping you since eight o’clock. Why didn’t…?” His voice trailed off as he looked at her. “Christ, Alicia, you look like absolute, total shit.”

That was a somewhat generous assessment of how she felt, but she didn’t want to talk about it.

“Thank you, Raymond. You don’t know the half of it.”

She didn’t head for her office, but toward the front reception area instead. Raymond paced her.

“Where are you going?”

“Just give me a minute, will you, Raymond?” she snapped. “I’ll be right back.”

She regretted being so short with him, but she felt stretched to the breaking point. One more tug in the wrong direction…

She was vaguely aware of Tiffany saying hello as she hurried past the reception desk on her way to the front door. Stepping aside to allow a middle-aged woman and her two grandchildren to enter, Alicia peered through the glass at the street outside, looking for the gray car.

She was sure it had followed her back from 48th Street. At least she thought it had. A gray car – what would you call it? A sedan? She didn’t know a damn thing about cars. Couldn’t tell a Ford from a Chevy. But whatever it was, she’d kept catching sight of this gray car passing her as she walked. It would turn a block or two ahead of her, and disappear for a few minutes, then cruise by again. Never too close. Never too slow. Never a definite sign of interest. But always there.

She scanned Seventh Avenue outside, half expecting to see it roll by. Across the street and slightly downtown, she checked the curb in front of her least favorite part of the St. Vincent’s complex. The O’Toole Building squatted at the corner of Twelfth. Its white-tiled, windowless, monolithic facade did not fit here in the Village. It looked as if a clumsy giant had accidentally dropped the modernistic monstrosity on his way to someplace like Minneapolis.

No gray car, though. But with all the gray cars in Manhattan, how could she be sure?

Her nerves were getting to her. She was becoming paranoid.

But who could blame her after this morning?

She headed back to her office. Raymond picked her up in the hall.

“Now can we talk?”

“Sorry I snapped at you.”

“Don’t be silly, honey. Nobody snaps at me. Nobody dares.”

Alicia managed a smile.

Raymond – never “Ray,” always “Raymond” – Denson, NP had been one of the original caregivers at the Center for Children with AIDS. The Center had MD’s who were called “director” and “assistant director,” but it was this particular nurse practitioner who ran the place. Alicia doubted the Center would survive if he left. Raymond knew all the ins and outs of the day-to-day functions, all the soft touches for requisitions, knew where all the bodies were buried, so to speak. He clocked in at around fifty, she was sure – God help you if you asked his age – but he kept himself young looking: close cropped hair, neat mustache, trim, athletic body.

“And about my beeper,” she said, “I turned it off. Doctor Collings was covering for me. You knew that.”

He paced her down the narrow hallway to her office. All the walls in the Center had been hurriedly erected, and the haste showed. Slapdash taping and spackling, and a quick coat of bright yellow paint that was already wearing though in places. Well, the decor was the least important thing here.

“I know, but this wasn’t medical. This wasn’t even administrative. This was fucking criminal.”

Something in Raymond’s voice… his eyes. He was furious. But not at her. But then what?

A premonition chilled her. Were her personal troubles going to spill over into the Center now?

As she continued walking she noted knots of staff – nurses, secretaries, volunteers – all with their heads together, all talking animatedly.

All furious.

An icy gale blew through her.

“All right, Raymond. Lay it on me.”

“The toys. Some rat bastard motherfucker stole the toys.”

Astonished, disbelieving, Alicia stopped and stared at him. No way. This had to be some cruel, nasty joke. But Raymond was anything but cruel.

And were those tears in the corners of his eyes?

“The donations? Don’t tell me–”

But he was nodding and biting his upper lip.

“Aw, no.”

“Every last one.”

Alicia felt her throat tighten. Strangely enough – and she damned herself for it – this was hitting her harder than Leo Weinstein’s death.

A man she knew, a man with a wife and family was dead, and yet… and yet… this felt so much worse.

She’d met Weinstein only a couple of times. But these toys… she and Raymond – especially Raymond – had been collecting them for months, sending staff and volunteers to forage all through the city for donors – companies, stores, individuals, anybody. The response had been slow at first – who was thinking about Christmas gifts in October? But once Thanksgiving was past, the giving had picked up. Last night they’d had a storeroom full of dolls, trucks, rockets, coloring books, action figures… the works.

This morning…

“How?”

“Pried open the outer door and took them away through the alley. Must have had some sort of truck to hold everything.”

The ground floor of this building had been a business supply store before being converted to the Center for Children with AIDS. The former owners probably had loaded their delivery trucks the same way the thieves had stolen the gifts.

“Isn’t that door alarmed? Aren’t all the doors alarmed?”

Raymond nodded. “Supposed to be. But the alarm didn’t go off.”

Poor Raymond. He’d put his whole heart into this effort.

Alicia reached her office, tossed her bag onto her desk, and dropped into her chair. She was still shaken. And her feet were killing her. She closed her eyes. Only halfway through the morning and she felt exhausted. She looked up at Raymond.

“Did anything like this ever happen to Doctor Landis?”

He shook his head. “Never.”

“Great. They wait until she’s gone, then they strike.”

“I think that’s all for the best, don’t you think? I mean, considering her condition.”

Alicia had to agree. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

Dr. Rebecca Landis was the director of the Center – at least she had the title. But she was in her third trimester and developing pre-eclamptic symptoms. Her OB had ordered her to stay home in bed.

This only a week after the assistant director had left to take a position at Beth Israel, leaving the place to be “directed” by Alicia and the other pediatric infectious disease specialist, Ted Collings. Ted had begged off any directing duties, claiming a wife and a new baby. And so the burden of administrative duties had fallen on the Center’s newbie: Alicia Clayton, MD.

“Any chance it was an inside job?”

“The police are looking into it.”

“The police?”

“Yes. Been here and gone. I made out the report.”

“Thank you, Raymond.” Good old Raymond. She couldn’t imagine how he could be more efficient. “What do they think about our chances of getting those toys back?”

“They’re going to ‘work on it.’ But just to make sure they do, I want to call the papers. You okay with that?”

“Yeah, good idea. Make this a high-profile crime. Maybe that’ll put extra pressure on the cops.”

“Great. I’ve already spoken to the Post. The News and the Times will have people here later this morning.”

“Oh. Well…good. You’ll see them, okay?”

“If you wish.”

“I wish. Tell them it’s not just stealing, and it’s not just stealing from little kids – it’s stealing from kids who’ve already got less than nothing, who’re carrying a death sentence in their bloodstreams and may not even be here next Christmas.”

“That’s beautiful. Maybe you should–”

“No, please, Raymond. I can’t.”

Feeling utterly miserable, she tuned out for a moment.

“What else can happen today?” she muttered. “Bad news always comes in threes, doesn’t it?

Raymond still hovered beyond her desk. “Something with that ‘family matter’ you’ve been dealing with?” he said, then added – pointedly: “All by yourself?”

He knew she’d been seeing lawyers and been preoccupied lately, and he seemed to take it personally that she wouldn’t discuss it with him. She felt sorry for him. He freely discussed his personal life with her – more than a few times she’d wanted to block her ears and say Too much information! – but she couldn’t reciprocate. Her own personal life was pretty much a void, and the disaster area that posed as her family was not something Alicia wanted to share, even with someone as sympathetic and non-judgmental as Raymond.

“Yes. That ‘family matter.’ But that’s not as important as getting those toys back. We had a super Christmas set up for those kids and I don’t want it going down the tubes. I want those toys back, Raymond, and dammit – get me the Police Commissioner’s number. I’m going to call him myself. I’m going to call him every day until those toys are back.”

“I’ll look it up right now,” he said, and was gone, closing the door behind him.

Alicia folded her arms on the scarred top of her beat-up old desk and dropped her forehead onto them. Everything seemed to be spinning out of control. She felt so helpless, so damn impotent. Systems… always these huge, complex, lumbering systems to deal with.

The Center’s toys were gone. She’d have to depend on the police to get them back. But they had their own agenda, their own higher priorities, and so she’d have to wait until they got around to hers, if they ever did. She could call the Commissioner until she wore out the buttons on her phone, but he’d probably never take the call.

And the will had said the house was hers, but Thomas was using the system’s labyrinth to keep it from her. On her own, Alicia would have been swallowed up by his legal pit bulls, so she’d been forced to hire someone to fend them off.

Leo…oh, God, poor Leo. She could still hear the blast, see the flames. Nothing had been left of him after that explosion.

A cold sick dread seeped through her. When’s my turn? If I keep pushing Thomas and whoever’s backing him, will I be next?

She pounded her fist on the desk. Damn them!

She wanted one of those big samurai blades – a dai-katana – to cut right to the heart of–

“Excuse me.”

Alicia looked up. One of the volunteers, a pretty blonde in her early thirties, stood halfway through the doorway, looking at her.

“I knocked but I guess you didn’t hear me.”

Alicia straightened and shook back her hair. She put on her professional face.

“Sorry. I was a million miles away, dreaming about chasing down the rats who stole those presents.”

The woman slipped her svelte body the rest of the way through and shut the door behind her. Alicia wished she had a body like that.

She’d seen her around a lot. Sometimes she brought her daughter with her – cute little girl, maybe seven or eight. What were their names?

“You won’t have to go a million miles to find them,” the woman said. “One or two should cover it.”

“You’re probably right,” Alicia said.

Her name…her name… what was her name?

Got it. “Gia, isn’t it?”

She smiled. “Gia DiLauro.”

A dazzling smile. Alicia wished she had a smile like that. And Gia… what a great name. Alicia wished–

Enough.

“Yes, you and your daughter…”

“Vicky.”

“Right. Vicky. You donate a lot of time here.”

Gia shrugged. “Can’t think of a place that needs it more.”

“You’ve got that right.”

The Center was a black hole of need.

“Can I talk to you a minute?”

She looked at Gia more closely and saw that her eyes were red. Had she been crying?

“Sure.” She had no time, but this woman donated so much of hers to the Center, the least Alicia could do was give her a few minutes. “Sit down. Are you okay?”

“No,” she said, gliding into the chair. Her eyes got redder. “I’m so angry I could… I don’t like thinking about what I’d like to do to the scum that stole those toys.”

“It’s okay. The police are working on it.”

“But you’re not holding your breath, right?”

Alicia shrugged and sighed. “No. I guess not. But they’re all we’ve got.”

“Not necessarily.”

Alicia looked at her. “What do you mean?”

She leaned forward and lowered her voice. “I know someone…”

And we know who that “someone” is… Legacies

April

Interlude at Duane’s

In January 2005, David Morrell and I were instructors at the Borderlands Bootcamp for Writers. David had helped start the International Thriller Writers organization the previous year and induced me to join. ITW in turn induced me to donate a Repairman Jack story to their anthology (Thriller) to raise funds for the organization.

Thus was "Interlude at Duane’s" born. The Thriller table of contents is a Who’s Who of thriller writers. All contributors were limited to a 5K word count. I could have used more. Toward the end I was on fire, burning up the keyboard. I wish I could write with that speed and intensity all the time.

As you’ll see, this one was fun.

Thriller went on to become one of the bestselling anthologies of all time. And I didn’t get a dime royalty. But I did gain a ton of new readers. Many of the zillion or so people who bought the anthology had never heard of Jack. Since then I regularly run into devoted Jack fans who say their first contact with the character was in Thriller. Doing well while doing good… nothing wrong with that.

Ed Gorman chose it for his anthology The Deadly Bride and Other Great Mystery and Crime Stories of 2005.

Here’s a tempting morsel…

Interlude at Duane’s

(sample)

“Lemme tell you, Jack,” Loretta said, blotting perspiration from her fudgecicle skin, “these changes gots me in a baaaad mood.”

They’d just finished playing some real-life Frogger jaywalking 57th and were now chugging west.

“Real bad. My feets killin me too. Nobody better hassle me afore I’m home and on the outside of a big ol glass of Jimmy.”

Jack nodded, paying just enough attention to be polite. He was more interested in the passersby and was thinking how a day without your carry was like a day without clothes.

He felt naked. Had to leave his trusty Glock and backup home today because of his annual trip to the Empire State Building. He’d designated April 19th King Kong Day. Every year he made a pilgrimage to the observation deck to leave a little wreath in memory of the Big Guy. The major drawback to the outing was the metal detector everyone had to pass through before heading upstairs. That meant no heat.

He didn’t think he was being paranoid. Okay, maybe a little, but he’d pissed off his share of people in this city and didn’t care to run into them naked.

After the wreath-laying ceremony, he ran into Loretta and walked her back toward Hell’s Kitchen. Oh, wait. It was Clinton now.

They went back a dozen or so years to when both waited tables at a now-extinct trattoria on West Fourth. She’d been fresh up from Mississippi then, and he only a few years out of Jersey. Agewise, Loretta had a good decade on Jack, maybe more – might even be knocking on the door to fifty. Had a good hundred pounds on him too. Her Rubenesque days were just a fond, slim memory, but she was solid – no jiggle. She’d dyed her Chia Pet hair orange and sheathed herself in some shapeless, green-and-yellow thing that made her look like a brown manatee in a muumuu.

She stopped and stared at a black cocktail dress in a boutique window.

“Ain’t that pretty. Course I’ll have to wait till I’m cremated afore I fits into it.”

They continued to Seventh Avenue. As they stopped on the corner and waited for the walking green, two Asian women came up to her.

The taller one said, “You know where Saks Fifth Avenue?”

Loretta scowled. “On Fifth Avenue, fool.” Then she took a breath and jerked a thumb over her shoulder. “That way.”

Jack looked at her. “You weren’t kidding about the bad mood.”

“You ever know me to kid, Jack?” She glanced around. “Sweet Jesus, I need me some comfort food. Like some chocolate-peanut-butter-swirl ice cream.” She pointed to the Duane Reade on the opposite corner. “There.”

“That’s a drugstore.”

“Honey, you know better’n that. Duane’s got everything. Shoot, if mine had a butcher section I wouldn’t have to shop nowheres else. Come on.”

Before he could opt out, she grabbed his arm and started hauling him across the street.

“I specially like their makeup. Some places just carry Cover Girl, y’know, which is fine if you a Wonder Bread blonde. Don’t know if you noticed, but white ain’t zackly a big color in these parts. Everybody darker. Cept you, a course. I know you don’t like attention, Jack, but if you had a smidge of coffee in your cream you’d be really invisible.”

Jack expended a lot of effort on being invisible. He’d inherited a good start with his average height, average build, average brown hair, and nondescript face. Today he’d accessorized with a Mets cap, flannel shirt, worn Levi’s, and battered work boots. Just another guy, maybe a construction worker, ambling along the streets of Zoo York.

Jack slowed as they approached the door.

“Think I’ll take a raincheck, Lo.”

She tightened her grip on his arm. “Hell you will. I need some company. I’ll even buy you a Dew. Caffeine still your drug of choice?”

“Guess…till it’s time for a beer.” He eased his arm free. “Okay, I’ll spring for five minutes, but after that, I’m gone. Things to do.”

“Five minutes ain’t nuthin, but okay.”

“You go ahead. I’ll be right with you.”

He slowed in her wake so he could check out the entrance. He spotted a camera just inside the door, trained on the comers and goers.

He tugged down the brim of his hat and lowered his head. He was catching up to Loretta when he heard a loud, heavily accented voice.

“Mira! Mira! Mira! Look at the fine ass on you!”

Jack hoped that wasn’t meant for him. He raised his head far enough to see a grinning, mustachioed Latino leaning against the wall next to the doorway. A maroon gym bag sat at his feet. He had glossy, slicked-back hair and prison tats on the backs of his hands.

Loretta stopped and stared at him. “You better not be talkin a me!”

His grin widened. “But señorita, in my country it is a privilege for a woman to be praised by someone like me.”

“And just where is this country of yours?”

“Ecuador.”

“Well, you in New York now, honey, and I’m a bitch from the Bronx. Talk to me like that again and I’m gonna Bruce Lee yo ass.”

“But I know you would like to sit on my face.”

“Why? Yo nose bigger’n yo dick?”

This cracked up a couple of teenage girls leaving the store. Mr. Ecuador’s face darkened. He didn’t seem to appreciate the joke.

Head down, Jack crowded close behind Loretta as she entered the store.

She said, “Told you I was in a bad mood.”

“That you did, that you did. Five minutes, Loretta, okay?”

“I hear you.”

He glanced over his shoulder and saw Mr. Ecuador pick up his gym bag and follow them inside.

Jack paused as Loretta veered off toward one of the cosmetic aisles. He watched to see if Ecuador was going to hassle her, but he kept on going, heading toward the rear.

Duane Reade drugstores are a staple of New York life. The city has hundreds of them. Only the hoity-toitiest Upper East Siders hadn’t visited one. Their most consistent feature was their lack of consistency. No two were the same size or laid out alike. Okay, they all kept the cosmetics near the front, but after that it became anyone’s guess where something might be hiding. Jack could see the method to that madness: The more time people had to spend looking for what they had come for, the greater their chances of picking up things they hadn’t.

This one seemed fairly empty and Jack assigned himself the task of finding the ice cream to speed their departure. He set off through the aisles and quickly became disoriented. The overall space was L-shaped, but instead of running in parallel paths to the rear, the aisles zigged and zagged. Whoever laid out this place was either a devotee of chaos theory or a crop circle designer.

He was wandering among the six-foot-high shelves and passing the hemorrhoid treatments when he heard a harsh voice behind him.

“Keep movin, yo. Alla way to the back.”

Jack looked and saw a big, steroidal black guy in a red tank top. The overhead fluorescents gleamed off his shaven scalp. He had a fat scar running through his left eyebrow, glassy eyes, and held a snub-nose .38 caliber revolver – the classic Saturday night special.

Jack kept his cool and held his ground. “What’s up?”

The guy raised the gun, holding it sideways like in movies, the way no one who knew squat about pistols would be caught dead holding one.

“Ay yo, get yo ass in gear fore I bust one in yo face.”

Jack waited a couple more seconds to see if the guy would move closer and put the pistol within reach. But he didn’t.

Not good. On the way to the rear, the big question was whether this was personal or not. When he saw the gaggle of frightened-looking people – the white-coated ones obviously pharmacists – kneeling before the rear counter with their hands behind their necks, he figured it wasn’t.

A relief… sort of.

He spotted Mr. Ecuador standing over them with a gleaming nickel-plated .357 revolver.

Robbery.

The black guy pushed him from behind.

“Assume the position, asshole.”

You can watch Jack take these guys apart in Quick Fixes – Tales of Repairman Jack

April

Conspiracies

(illo by reader Xiao Yu)

(includes “Home Repairs”)

Rasalom and Jack meet for the first time, though Rasalom doesn’t know Jack is the Heir, and Jack has no idea of Rasalom’s true nature. But Maurico suspects that Jack is more than he seems…

Wow, did I have fun with this one. Maybe too much fun. Because I decided upon completing it that I would commit to writing the series.

Here’s where I solidified the pattern of giving Jack both a mundane problem and a weird problem to fix in each novel. The mundane fix involves a wife-beating hubby. For that I borrowed a Repairman Jack short story called “Home Repairs” and incorporated it into the story.

For the weird fix, I involved him in a UFO/conspiracy convention on Manhattan’s West Side. I even went to a similar convention in Laughlin, NV, to research it. It seems this woman who is in charge of SESOUP (The Society for the Exposure of Secret Organizations and Unacknowledged Phenomena.) has disappeared. You can imagine what a group of conspiracy theorists thinks about that.

I feared I might have put too much humor in Conspiracies, but readers didn’t think so.

Here follows one of their favorite exchanges as Jack and Abe discuss life and death and conspiracies.

CONSPIRACIES

(sample)

“So why should you call them nuts?” Abe said. ”We are surrounded by conspiracies.”

Jack had swung by the Isher Sports Shop to say hello to Abe Grossman, a graying Humpty Dumpty of a man in his late fifties with a forehead that went on almost forever, and Jack’s oldest friend in the city. In the world. They sat in their usual positions: Jack leaning on the customer side of the scarred wooden counter, Abe perched on his stool behind it, and around them, a gallimaufry of sporting goods tossed carelessly onto sagging shelves lining narrow aisles or hung from ceiling hooks, all in perpetual, undusted disarray. A Sports Authority outlet designed and maintained by Oscar Madison. One of the reasons Jack liked coming here was that it made his apartment look neat and roomy.

“You know the root of the word?” Abe said. “Conspire: it means to breathe together. The world is rife with all sorts of people and institutions breathing together. Just take a look–” He broke off and cocked his head toward the pale blue parakeet perched on his stained left shoulder. “What’s that, Parabellum? No, we can’t do that. Jack is a friend.”

Parabellum tilted his beak toward Abe’s ear and looked as if he were whispering into it.

“Well, most of the time he is,” Abe said, then straightened his head and looked at Jack. “See? Conspiracies everywhere. Just now, right in front of you, Parabellum tried to engage me in a conspiracy against you for not bringing him a snack. I should be worried if I were you.”

Usually Jack brought something edible, but he’d neglected to this time.

“You mean I can’t drop in without bringing an offering?” Jack said. “This was a spur of the moment thing.”

Abe looked offended. “For me – feh! – I shouldn’t care. It’s for Parabellum. He gets hungry this time of the day.”

Jack pointed to the Technicolor droppings that festooned the shoulders of Abe’s half-sleeve white shirt. “Looks like Parabellum’s had plenty to eat already. You sure he doesn’t have colitis or something?”

“He’s a fine healthy bird. It’s just that he gets upset by strangers – and by so-called friends who don’t bring him an afternoon snack.”
Jack glanced pointedly at Abe’s bulging shirt front. “I’ve seen where the bird’s snacks usually end up.”

“If you’re going to start on my weight again, you should save your breath.”

“Wasn’t going to say a word.”

But he wanted to. Jack was getting worried about Abe. An overweight, sedentary, Type-A personality, he was a heart attack waiting to happen. Jack couldn’t bear the thought of anything happening to Abe. He loved this man. The decades that separated their birthdays hadn’t kept them from becoming the closest of friends. Abe was the only human being besides Gia Jack could talk to – really talk to. Together they had solved the world’s problems many times over. He could not imagine day-to-day life without Abe Grossman.

So Jack had cut back on the goodies he traditionally brought whenever he stopped by, or now if he did bring something, he’d sworn it would be low cal or low fat – preferably both.

“Anyway, I should be worried about weight? If I want to lose some, I can do it anytime. When I’m ready, I’ll go to Egypt and eat from street carts for two weeks. You’ll see. Dysentery does wonders for the waistline. Richard Simmons should be so effective.”

“Im-Ho-Tep’s revenge, ay?” Jack said, keeping it light. He didn’t want to be a complete pain in the ass. “When do you leave?”

“I have a call in to my travel agent now. I’m not sure when she’ll get back to me. Maybe next year. But what about you? Why are you so careful with your foods? A guy in your line of work should worry about cholesterol?”

“I’m an optimist.”

“You’re too healthy is what’s wrong with you. If you don’t get shot or stabbed or clubbed to death by one of the many people you’ve royally pissed off in your life, what can you die from?”

“I’m doing research. I’ll find something interesting, I hope.”

“Nothing you’ll die of! And how will that look on your death certificate? ‘Cause of death: Nothing.’ Won’t you feel foolish? Such an embarrassment. It will have to be a closed-coffin service to hide your red face. And really, how could I come to your funeral knowing you died of nothing?”

“Maybe I’ll just die of shame.”

“At least it’s something. But before you pass on, let me tell you a little something about conspiracies.”

“Figured you have something to say on the subject.”

“Indeed I do. Remember that global economic holocaust I used to warn you about?”

For years Abe had gone on and on about the impending collapse of the global economy. He still maintained a mountain retreat upstate, stocked with gold coins and freeze-dried food.

“The one that didn’t happen?”

“The reason it didn’t happen is that they didn’t want it to happen.”

“Who’s ‘they’?”

“The cabal of international bankers that manipulates the global currency markets, of course.”

“Of course.”

Here we go, Jack thought. This ought to be good.

“’Of course,’ he says,” Abe said, speaking to Parabellum. “Skepticalman Jack thinks his old friend is meshugge.” He turned back to Jack. “Remember when the Asian and Russian markets went into free fall a while back?”

“Vaguely.”

“’Vaguely,’ he says.”

“You know I don’t follow the markets.” Since he didn’t own stocks, Jack pretty much ignored Wall Street.

“Then I’ll refresh your memory. Not so long ago the bottoms fell out of all the Asian markets. Less than a year later, the same thing in Russia, making rubles good only for toilet paper. People were losing their shirts and their pants, banks and brokerage houses were failing, Asian brokers were hanging themselves or jumping out windows. Do you think that just happened? No. It was planned, it was orchestrated, and certain people made money that should be measured in cosmological terms.”

“What people?”

“The members of the cabal. They’re drawn from the old royal families and international banking families of Europe along with descendants of our own robber barons. Most of their influence is concentrated in the West, and they were probably miffed at being left out of all the emerging economies booming in Asia. So they invited themselves in. They manipulated Asian currencies, inflated the markets, then pulled the plug.”

Jack had to ask: “How does that help them?”

“Simple: They sell short before the crash. When prices have bottomed out – and they know when that is because they and their buddies are pulling the strings – they cover their short positions. But that’s only half of the equation. They don’t stop there. They use their stupendous short profits to buy up damaged properties and companies at fire sale prices.”

“So now they’ve got a piece of the action.”

“And no small piece. After the crash, enormous amounts of Thai and Indonesian stock and property were bought up at five cents on the dollar by shadow corporations. And since the lion’s share of profits from those upstart countries will now be flowing into the cabal’s coffers, those economies will be allowed to improve.”

“Okay,” Jack said. “But who are they? What are their names? Where do they live?”

“Names? You want I should give you names? How about their addresses too? What’s Repairman Jack going to do? Pay them a little visit?”

“Well, no. I just–”

“If I knew their names, I’d probably be dead. I don’t want to know their names. Someone else should know their names and stop them. They’ve been pulling the world’s economic strings for centuries but no one ever does anything. No one hunts them down and calls them to account. Why is that, Jack? Tell me: Is it ignorance or apathy?”

“I don’t know and couldn’t care less,” Jack said with a shrug.

Abe opened his mouth, then closed it and stared at him.

Jack fought the grin that threatened to break free. Goading Abe was precious fun.

Finally Abe turned to Parabellum. “You see what I put up with from this man? I try to enlighten him as to the true nature of things, and what does he do? Wise he cracks.”

“As if you really believe all that,” Jack said, grinning.

Abe stared at him, saying nothing.

Jack felt his smile fading. “You don’t really believe in an international financial cabal, do you?”

“I should tell you? But one thing you should know is that a good conspiracy theory is a mechaieh. And also great fun. But this group you mentioned, this Bouillabaisse–”

”SESOUP.”

“Whatever. I’ll bet it’s not fun for them. I’ll bet it’s very serious business for them: UFO’s and other stuff far from the mainstream.”

“UFO’s are mainstream?”

“They’ve been mainstreamed. That’s why sightings are up: believing is seeing, if you should get my drift. But when you start talking with members of Zuppa De Peche–”

“SESOUP.”

“Whatever – I bet you’ll run into meshuggeners so far from the mainstream they’re not even wet.”

“I can hardly wait.” Jack glanced at his watch. “Look, I’ve got to be heading out to the Island. Can I borrow your truck?”

“What’s the matter with Ralph?”

“Sold him.”

“No!” Abe seemed genuinely shocked. “But you loved that car.”

“I know.” Jack had hated parting his 1963 white Corvair convertible. “But I didn’t have much choice. Ralph’s become a real collector’s item. Everywhere I took him people stopped and asked me about him, wanted to buy him. Don’t need that kind of attention.”

“Too bad. All right, since you’re in mourning, take the truck, but remember: she only likes high test.”

“That old V6?”

Abe shrugged. “I shouldn’t spoil my women?” He extracted the truck keys from his pocket and handed them to Jack as the bell on the shop’s front jangled. A customer entered: a tanned, muscular guy with short blond hair.

“Looks like a weekend warrior,” Jack said.

Abe returned Parabellum to his cage. “I’ll get rid of him.”

“Don’t bother. I’ve got to go.”

With obvious reluctance, Abe slid off the stool and left his sanctum behind the counter. He sounded bored as he approached the customer.

“What overpriced recreational nonsense can I sell you today?”

Jack headed for the door, holding up the truck keys as he passed Abe.

Abe waved, then turned back to his customer. “Water skis? You want to spend your free time sliding on top of water? What on earth for? It’s dangerous. And besides, you could hit a fish. Imagine the headache you’d cause the poor thing. A migraine should be half so bad…”

More mayhem and merriment await in… Conspiracies

May

ALL THE RAGE

(cover variant for the limited with red type)

I often list All the Rage as including “The Last Rakosh,” but it was actually written around that particular short story.

In 1990 I was slated to be guest of honor at the World Fantasy Convention along with Susan Allison, Robert Bloch, L. Sprague de Camp, Raymond Feist, David Mattingly, and Julius Schwartz. (What a lineup!) It’s traditional for the guests to contribute a story to the convention program. The chairman that year was Bob Weinberg and his wife, Phyllis, was a major Repairman Jack fan. I’d brought Jack back for “A Day in the Life,” so could I please bring him back for the convention? Pleeease? How could I say no?

I began with the premise that not all the rakoshi had died when Jack blew up Kusum’s ship, and then I added some of new characters I’d created for Freak Show, the anthology I’d started putting together for HWA (which eventually led to “The Peabody-Ozymandias Traveling Circus & Oddity Emporium”).

“The Last Rakosh” begged for expansion so I built a novel around it. As often happens with me, I had no title. But my buddy Steve Spruill read it and come up with All the Rage. Perfect.

It contains some of the best fixes I ever came up with for Jack. Here’s one of them…

ALL THE RAGE

(sample)

1

Sal Vituolo huddled on an East Hampton dune and wondered what the hell he was doing. Freakin’ long ride to get here, and the sand being damp and chilly wasn’t helping matters much. He hoped this was going to be worth all the trouble.

And expense. This Repairman Jack guy didn’t come cheap. Sal had tried to pay him in car parts but it was cash – and lots of it – or nothing. He hadn’t particularly featured handing over that much dough with no receipt, no guarantee. Guy could be a scammer and just take off, but sometimes you just had to put aside everything you’d learned in the school of hard knocks and go with your gut. Sal’s gut said this Jack was a stand-up guy.

But maybe not wrapped too tight. Tires? What did he want with a freakin’ truckload of old tires?

The guy had shown up this afternoon to pick up the rubber and his money. Then he told Sal to go out and rent a videocam, a professional model with the best zoom lens and low light capabilities, and haul it out here to where he could see Dragovic’s house. Keep your distance but get as close as you can without being spotted, he’d said. Sal wasn’t sure exactly what that meant, but here he was.

He glanced around uneasily, hoping no one was watching him – especially no one from Dragovic’s crew. No telling what would happen to him if he got caught spying on the party.

He checked his watch. Ten o’clock. Jack had said start taping at ten, so Sal flicked on the power and settled into the eyepiece. He’d been practicing with the videocam since he got here, and had the workings down pretty good. At maximum zoom, the telephoto night lens magnified the light and the house to the point where Sal felt like he was looking at the place from twenty feet away.

He’d peeped the party off and on. Looked like the Slippery Serb was tossing a bash for his boys and his big customers. The crowd was all guys, some in suits, some in sweaters or golf shirts. Sal knew the type from their haircuts and their swagger – Eurotrash and local tough guys, probably the kind Dragovic’s lawyers would refer to in court as “business associates.”

Sal had watched them chow down on the best damn buffet he’d ever seen – whole lobsters, soft-shelled crabs, a sushi chef, carvers serving everything from prime-rib to filet, a raw bar, a caviar bar with bottles of flavored vodkas jutting from a mound of shaved ice – until he got so hungry he had to turn off the camera.

As he focused the scene now, he noticed something new going on at the party. A bunch of bikinis were splashing around in the pool. Where’d they come from? The guys were all hanging around the water, sipping after-dinner drinks, smoking fat cigars, and watching.

Sal felt his shoulder muscles knot… he’d bet his life that somewhere in that crowd were the guys who splattered Artie all over Church Avenue. He could be looking at them right now.

What am I doing videotaping a party? What for? And where do Jack and my old tires come in?

Then he heard the helicopter.

2

“My, what interesting people,” Cino said.

Her sarcastic tone irritated Milos. They stood in the corner where the main house joined its eastern wing. Drinks in hand – Ketel One for Milos, the ever-present Dampierre for Cino – they leaned on the railing of the highest tier of one of the multi-level decks and surveyed Milos’s guests below.

Cino wore a high-collared embroidered kimono-like dress of red silk that clung to every curve of her slim body on its way to her ankles. With her dark bangs and jet eyes, she looked Oriental tonight.

“I’m sure you’ll be more impressed with Sunday’s guest list,” he said. “The beautiful people are more your type. But these folk” – he gestured with a sweep of his arm–”are the ones who make this place and this party possible. My buyers, sellers, suppliers, and distributors.”

“Distributors of what?” Cino asked with a mischievous grin as she leaned against him like a cat. She’d been hitting the champagne since midafternoon and her glittering eyes said she was feeling little pain.

Milos returned her smile. “Of the many items I import and export.”

“What kind of items?”

“Whatever is in demand,” he said.

“And the bathing beauties,” she said, jutting her chin at the pool. “Are they part of your distribution network too?”

“Hardly. They’re items in demand, which I imported from the city especially for the occasion.”

He’d hired the best-looking girls from a number of strip clubs and vanned them out for the night. Their job was an easy one: party, have a good time, wear very little, and be very friendly.

“Ah,” Cino said. “Window dressing.”

“More like party favors.”

Cino seemed to think this was very funny, and Milos enjoyed the ringing sound of her laughter as he watched the girls. Nature and silicone had provided them with fabulous bodies. They were on display now, but their real work would begin after they dried off. They had been instructed as to the pecking order of the guests and, keeping that in mind, were to pair off with anyone who was interested.

Tonight was supposedly a little bonus for the key people in the network of drugs and guns and currency that fed Milos’s operations. Many races down there on the patio: Italians, Greeks, Africans, Koreans, Mexicans, all soon to be part of his growing empire. His was now an international business, and thus had to be an international man and deal with everyone. Of course for his personal operations and security he used only full-blooded Serbs, hard, loyal men, blooded in battle.

But this gathering was more than just a party. It was a testimonial, an affirmation of sorts. They were here as Milos’s guests. Some of them might harbor an inkling in the backs of their minds that they could be his equal, but tonight should lay that to rest. This wasn’t neutral territory where equals meet. They had come to his place, where he called the shots; they were enjoying themselves on his tab, and getting a good look at his impressive new digs. They were in a position where the fact that Milos Dragovic was the man was being pounded home every minute of their stay.

They were down there with the bimbos, he was up here with the supermodel. Didn’t that say it all.

Forty-eight hours from now things would be very different. No business associates, no bodies in the pool. Sunday would be purely social, to establish and enhance his status among the big names out here.

“What’s that noise?” Cino said.

Milos recognized the rapid wup-wup-wup that seemed to come from everywhere. “Sounds like a helicopter.”

And then he saw it, maybe a hundred feet up, gliding in from over the ocean. A bulging net of some sort dangled beneath it. Milos couldn’t see what was in the net, but it looked full of whatever it was. Some new way of fishing, maybe? But no water was dripping from the net.

Whatever he was up to, Milos thought, the pilot shouldn’t be flying that sort of cargo over homes. If that net should tear…

“Oh, look,” Cino said. “He’s stopped right overhead.”

That was when the first suspicion that something might be wrong flitted through Milos’s mind. It became stronger when he noticed that the helicopter didn’t have any numbers on it. He didn’t know the exact rules, but every damn aircraft he’d ever seen had a string of numbers on the fuselage. This one either didn’t have any or someone had masked them.

Milos looked around and saw that the party had stopped dead. All his guests were standing still, looking up. Even the babes in the pool had stopped their splashing and were pointing at the sky.

“What do you think he’s up to with all those tires?” Cino said.

Tires? Milos looked up again. Damned if she wasn’t right. That net was full of tires. Must have been fifty of them at least.

What’s that asshole doing dangling all those tires right over my house?

And then the net opened…

And the tires tumbled free…

And fell directly toward him and the house.

Cino let out a high-pitched scream.

“Get inside!” Milos shouted as he turned to do just that, but she was already on her way, moving remarkably fast on her sky-high high heels.

Milos dove through the door just as the first tires hit the roof with the staccato thudding of a giant doing drum rolls with telephone poles, accenting with the cymbal crash of shattering skylights. An instant later other tires landed directly on the deck-patio area, smashing railings, overturning tables, wrecking the green house.

It wouldn’t have been so bad if that had been it. But the tires on the ground didn’t stop on impact, they kept moving, bouncing ten, fifteen feet in the air in all directions; the ones on the roof were even worse, caroming off the pitched tiles and sailing toward the pool.

Milos ducked as a tire slammed into a sliding glass door just a few feet to his left, cracking it but not breaking all the way through. Screams and panicked shouts rose from outside. Milos clung to the door frame, watching in horror as his party dissolved into chaos.

The girls in the pool were lucky – they ducked underwater as tires splashed around them. But the men on the decks and patio didn’t have that option. They scrambled around, fleeing in all directions, bumping into each other, occasionally knocking each other down as the tires rained on them, flattening them, knocking them into the pool, upending tables and sending food and flaming chafing dishes flying. The randomness of the assault, the unpredictable, helter-skelter nature of the trajectories added terror to the chaos.

Where was his security? He scanned the tumult and found a couple of them still upright. Splattered with an assortment of desserts, they crouched by one of the raised decks with their guns out and raised, eyes searching the sky. But the helicopter was nowhere in sight.

With the tires bouncing from the direction of the main house, and the wings hemming them in on both sides, those guests still upright had nowhere to run except toward the beach. The tires bounced in pursuit, catching up to some and knocking them face first into the sand.

It seemed as if the tires would never stop bouncing, but eventually, after what seemed like eons, the last one wobbled to a halt. Milos stepped outside and gazed in horror at the shambles that had once been the pride of his grounds. Every square foot had suffered some damage. The girls were wailing as they crawled shivering and dripping from the pool. The cracked decks and patio were littered with debris and battered men struggling to their feet, some groaning, some cradling broken limbs, a few out cold and lying where they had landed. It looked like a war zone, as if a bomb had exploded.

But worse than any physical destruction was the deep, hemorrhaging wound to Milos’s pride. Guests in his home, proud men here at his invitation, had been injured or – worse – caused to run like panicked children. Their humiliation while under his aegis was a double disgrace for Milos.

Who would want to do this to him? Why?

He searched above for the helicopter, but it was gone, as if it had never been.

Never had Milos felt so impotent, so mortified. He fought the urge to scream his rage at the moonless sky. He had to remain poised, appear to be in control – as much as one could be amid such havoc… and then his gaze came to rest on the tire that had almost smashed through into his living room. It was mud-stained and bald, so worn that its steel belts showed through in spots.

Junk! Bad enough that he’d been attacked in his home, but he’d been assaulted with garbage!

With a cry that was half roar, half scream, he picked up the tire and hurled it the rest of the way through the window.

As he watched it roll across his living room carpet, Milos Dragovic swore to find out who had done this and to have his revenge.

3

Sal’s body was bucking so hard from repressed laughter he had to turn off the camera. If only he could scream it out, lie on his back and guffaw at the sky! Of course that might attract the kind of attention that would stop all laughs for good. He wiped his eyes on his sleeves and, still giggling, hurried off the dune toward his car.

Oh, God, that was wonderful. Those tires bouncing all over the place, tough guys running around like a bunch of cockroaches when the light goes on, screeching like little old ladies. The Slippery Serb’s gotta be shitting a brick! And I got it all on tape!

When he reached his car he sat in the front seat and caught his breath. He stared out the window at the empty dunes.

Bad night for Dragovic, yeah, but was it enough for what he’d done to Artie? No. Not nearly enough.

But it was a start.

Check out the other fix-its in… All the Rage

June

Hosts

With Hosts I began sneaking Jack’s family back into his life.

The novel has an SF plot with a thematic purpose. I’m not much into themes in my fiction – at least not consciously – but I couldn’t resist pitting this ultimate individualist against the ultimate collective. As I wrote it I came to love Jack’s sister and I let that love carry over into the Teen Trilogy where she’s his go-to person in the family.

There’s a blatant Bugs Bunny reference in the novel that no one except one of my sons-in-law has caught.

I introduced the Lady here. I didn’t know what I was going to do with her but I like to toss things at Jack (and myself) and see how he deals with them. I wasn’t sure what she was at this point, but I wanted a Chorus character to help explain what was going on and chose her. I hadn’t written the Teen Trilogy yet but made her an integral part when I did.

I occasionally let real life intrude on my fiction. Jack’s opening scene is my response to the Colin Ferguson shootings on the LIRR in 1993 – 25 shot, 6 killed. All those people were hurt or killed because of New York’s victim disarmament laws. If only one – one – other passenger had been armed, many of those victims would have been spared. But all they could do was watch him methodically walk down the aisle shooting everyone he saw.

If Jack had been there, things would have been different, as you will see…

HOSTS

(sample)

Riding the Niner.

Sandy Palmer wondered what percentage of his twenty-five years he’d spent bumping and swaying along this particular set of subway tracks back and forth to Morningside Heights. And always in the last car, since that left him a few steps closer to his apartment.

Got to save those steps. He figured everyone was allotted only so many, and if you use them up too fast you’re looking at early death or a wheelchair. Obviously marathoners and the hordes of joggers crowding the city parks either were unaware of or gave little credence to the Sandy Palmer theory of step preservation and reclamation. They’d regret it later on.

Sandy glanced around the car at his fellow passengers. Seven years now riding either the Nine or the One, starting with his first semester at Columbia Journalism and the frequent trips down to the Village or SoHo, now every damn day getting jammed in on the way down to midtown and back for his job with The Light. And in all that time his fellow riders still looked pretty much the same as they always had. Maybe a few more whites in the mix these days, but not many.

Take this car, for instance: Relatively crowded for a post rush-hour run, but not SRO. Still a couple of empty seats. Working people – nurse’s aides, bus drivers, jackhammer operators, store clerks, short order cooks, garment workers. Their skin tones ran a bell curve, starting with very black, peaking in the mid-browns, and tapering off into lily-white land. After growing up in Caucasian Connecticut, Sandy had had to get used to being a member of a minority on the subway. He’d been a little uneasy at first, thinking that people were staring at him; it took months before he felt comfortable again in his white skin.

The white guy dozing diagonally across from him on the L-shaped plastic bench they shared mid-car looked pretty comfortable. Talk about generic pale male – if Sandy hadn’t been thinking about white people he probably wouldn’t have noticed him. Clean shaven, brown hair sticking out from under the dark blue knit cap pulled down to his eyebrows, an oversized white Jets shirt with a big green 80, jeans, and scuffed work boots. The color of his eyes was up for grabs because they were closed.

Sandy wondered what he did for a living. The clothes gave no clue other than the fact that he wasn’t white collar. Clean hands, not overly callused, though his thumbnails seemed unusually long.

The train slowed then and about a third of the passengers rose as signs announcing the FORTY-SECOND STREET / TIMES SQUARE station started slipping past the windows. The generic pale male opened his eyes to check the stop, then closed them again. Mild brown eyes. Definitely a GPM – an infinitely interchangeable example of the species.

Not like me, he thought. With my blond hair, hazel eyes, thick glasses, this big nose, and acne scars left over from my pre-Accutane teenage years, anyone could pick me out of a line-up in a minute.

New riders replaced those debarking almost one for one, spreading through the car in search of seats. He saw a slim young woman move toward a double seat at the very front of the car, but the man in it, a scraggly-bearded Asian guy in a stained fatigue jacket, with wild hair and wilder eyes, had his gym bag and a boom box on the empty half and he brusquely waved her away.

Wisely, she didn’t argue – he looked like the sort who was heavy into soliloquies – and went elsewhere in search of a seat. Sandy figured that was a potential blessing in disguise because she was moving toward the middle of the car, toward him.

Keep coming, he thought, wishing he were telepathic. I’ve got your seat – right here next to me.

She looked about twenty or so, all in black – sweater, tights, shoes, even the wire rims on her tiny funky glasses. She’d done one of those shoe-black dye jobs on her short, Winona Ryder-style hair, which made her pale face – not Winona Ryder’s face, unfortunately, but still pretty – look all the paler.

Sandy slid to his left, leaving half of his butt off the edge of the seat to give her plenty of room. She took the bait and slipped in next to him. She didn’t look at him, simply opened her book and began to read.

Instead of rejoicing, Sandy felt his insides tighten. What now? What to say?

Relax, he told himself. Just take a deep breath, figure out what you can about her, and see if you can find some common ground.

Easy to say, but so hard to do. At least for Sandy. He’d never done too well with women. He’d been to a couple of the campus counselors when he was a student and they’d both said the same thing: fear of rejection.

As if someone needed a Ph.D. to tell him that. Of course he feared rejection. Nobody in the whole damn world liked rejection, but that didn’t seem to stop people from courting it by coming on to each other with the lamest, sappiest lines. So why did the mere possibility of rejection paralyze him? The counselors liked to tell him the why of the fear didn’t matter so much as overcoming it.

Okay, he thought. Let’s overcome this. What have we got here? We’ve got a book-reading Goth chick heading uptown on the 9 express. Got to be a student. Probably Barnard.

As the train lurched into motion again, he checked out her book: Hitchcock by Francois Truffaut.

Bingo. Film student.

Okay. Here goes.

He wet his lips, swallowed, took that deep breath…

“Going for your film MFA, right?” he said.

And waited.

Nothing. She didn’t turn her head, didn’t even blink. She did move, but just to turn the page of her book. He might as well have used sign language on a blind person.

But he knew he hadn’t imagined speaking, knew he must have been audible because the GPM opened one of his eyes for a two-second look his way, then closed it again. Reminded Sandy of Duffy, their family cat: a one-eyed glance – two would require too much energy – was the only acknowledgment that chunky old tom granted when someone new entered his presence.

So now what? He felt like he was back in high school after asking some girl if she wanted to dance and she’d just said no. That had happened only once but that once had been enough to stop him from ever asking anyone again. Should he retreat now? Slink away and hide his head? Or push it?

Push it.

He raised his voice. “I said, are you going for your film MFA?”

She looked up, glanced at him with dark brown eyes for maybe a whole millisecond, then went back to her book.

“Yes,” she said, but she spoke to the book.

“I like Hitchcock,” he told her.

Again to the book: “Most people do.”

This was going nowhere fast. Maybe she’d warm up if she knew he’d gone to Columbia too.

“I graduated from the School of Journalism a couple of years ago.”

“Congratulations.”

That did it, Sandy, he thought. That broke the ice. She’s really hot for you now. Shit, why didn’t you just keep your mouth shut?

He racked his brain for another line. He’d already been given the cold shoulder; nothing left to lose now. He’d swum beyond his point of no return, so he had to keep going. She was either going to let him drown in a sea of rejection or send him a lifeboat.

He smiled. Just the kind of crappy imagery his journalism professors had tried to scour from his brain. One had even told him he wrote the most cliché-ridden prose he’d ever read. But what was the big deal about clichés? They served a purpose in journalism, especially tabloid journalism. Readers understood them, expected them, and probably felt something was missing if they didn’t run across a couple.

The sudden blast of music from the front of the car cut off the thought. Sandy looked around and saw that the wild-haired guy in the fatigue jacket had turned on his boom box and cranked it up to full volume. It was pumping out a sixties tune Sandy half knew–”Time Has Come Today” by the Something-or-other Brothers.

Back to the film student: Maybe he should dazzle her by mentioning his great job at the city’s most infamous weekly tabloid, The Light, where his degree from one of the country’s great journalism programs landed him an entry-level position one step above the janitorial staff – except in pay. Or how he’s been doing interviews at every other paper around the city trying to move up from The Light and no one’s calling back. That’ll impress her.

Oh, hell, go for gold and let her put you out of your misery.

“What’s your name?”

Without missing a beat she said, “Lina Wertmüller.”

Not just unfriendly, she thinks I’m an idiot. Well two can play that game.

Sandy stuck out his hand. “Glad to meet you, Lina. I’m Henry Louis Mencken, but you can call me H. L.”

To Sandy’s shock she lifted her head and laughed. He’d made a funny and she laughed. What a wonderful sound, even if he could barely hear it over the blasting music.

And then the name of the group behind the song came to him: the Chambers Brothers.

Suddenly – other sounds. Shouts, cries, screams, and people stumbling, scrambling past him in a mad rush toward the rear end of the car.

“It’s time now!” cried a voice. “Yes, it’s time.”

Sandy turned and saw the Asian in the fatigue jacket standing before the door at the front end of the car. His black eyes were mad, endlessly, vacantly mad, and he clutched in each hand a black pistol that seemed too long and too thick in the barrel. Then Sandy realized they were equipped with silencers.

Oh, Christ, he thought, shock launching him to his feet, he’s going to start shooting.

And then he saw the bodies and the blood and knew that the shooting had already begun. Images flashed through his instantly adrenalized brain as he turned to run – not everyone from the front of the car had made it to the rear; the first to be shot lay where they’d fallen…

…like the Korean guy, maybe Sandy’s age, with rust-colored hair and a Nike swoosh on his cap, sprawled on the red-splattered floor, facing Sandy with his headphones still on his ears, blood leaking from his nose, and black eyes staring into the beyond…

…like the heavy black woman in the two-piece sleeveless gray suit over a black polka dotted white blouse with starched pristine cuffs, lying face down, still twitching as the last of her life ran out from under her wig and stained the copy of “Rolie Polie Olie” that had spilled from her Barnes and Noble bag…

…or the others who’d hit the deck and now huddled and crouched and cringed between seats, holding up their hands palm out as if to stop the bullets, and pleading for mercy…

But they were asking the wrong guy, because the man with the guns was tuned to some other frequency as he shuffled along the aisle, swinging his pistols left and right and pumping bullets through the silencers. Phut!.. phut!… phut! The sounds barely audible through the music as slugs tore into heads and tear-stained faces, sometimes right through the supplicating hands. He moved without the slightest hint of urgency, looking for all the world like a suburban homeowner on a sunny Saturday morning strolling his lawn with a can of herbicide and casually spraying the weeds he passed.

And somewhere up there, up front, someone’s bowels had let loose and the stink was filling the car.

Brain screaming in panic, Sandy ducked and swung around and saw the GPM crouched behind his seat, facing the rear of the car, and he must have lost it because he was shouting something that sounded like, “Doesn’t anyone have a goddamn gun?”

Yeah, asshole! Sandy wanted to say. The guy standing in the aisle has two, and he’s coming your way!

Turning further Sandy came face to face with Lina or whoever she was and knew the naked fear in her blanched face must have mirrored his own. He looked past her at the rest of the screaming, panicked riders crammed like a mass of worms into the rear of the car, the nearer ones wriggling, kicking, biting, clawing to get further to the rear and the ones at the very back battling with all they had to stay where they were, and suddenly Sandy knew what the others had already discovered – that once you got back there you had nowhere to go unless you could find a way to open the rear door and jump onto the tracks at who-knew-how-many-miles an hour and hope that if you were lucky enough not to break your neck when you hit, you wouldn’t land on the third rail and get fried to a cinder.

He saw a brown hand snake upward at the rear of the press, grip the red emergency handle, and yank down…

Yes!

Saw the handle come free as the cord snapped.

And just then the Fifty-ninth Street / Columbus Circle station lit up around the train but it didn’t slow because oh shit this was the express damn it and it was going to skip Sixty-sixth Street as well and not stop until Seventy-second.

Seventy-second! No wonder the gunman was in no hurry. He had his prey cornered like cattle in a stockyard pen and could slaughter them at will – kill just about everyone before the train reached its next stop.

Sandy saw only one chance to save his life. If he could get to the rear there, worm his way through the massed crowd, even if he had to do it on hands and knees – he was thin, he could do it – and get as far back as he could and crawl under a seat, maybe he could survive until Seventy-second Street. That would be the end of it. When the doors opened the gunman would take off or blow his own brains out, and Sandy would be safe. All he had to do was survive until then.

Another glance at the gunman showed him pointing one of his pistols down at someone Sandy couldn’t see. The only visible part of the next victim was a pair of hands raised above the back of a seat, a woman’s hands, mocha colored, nails painted bright red, fingers interlocked as if in prayer.

Even more frightening was the realization that this faceless woman and the GPM appeared to be the last living people between Sandy and the killer. Panic took a choke hold on his throat as he turned and lunged toward the rear of the car – oh sweet Jesus he didn’t want to die he was too young and he hadn’t really begun to live so he couldn’t die now oh please not now not now – but the film student was there, half in, half out of a crouch and he slammed against her, knocking her over, and they both went down, Sandy landing on top as they hit the floor.

He was losing it now, ready to scream at the bitch for getting in his way, but more important than screaming was knowing right now, right this instant where the gunman was, so he looked back, praying he wouldn’t see that impassive bearded face looming behind the muzzle of a silencer. Instead he saw the GPM, whose face was set into grim lines of fury and whose eyes now were anything but mild, and he was muttering, “Shit-shit-shit!” and pulling up the cuff of his jeans where something leather was strapped and then he was yanking a metallic object from the leather and Sandy saw it was a tiny pistol. At first he thought it was one of those old-fashioned Derringers women and gamblers carried in westerns but when he saw the dude work the little slide back and forth he realized it was a miniature automatic.

And now the GPM – Sandy was finding it hard to think of him as generic anymore but didn’t have any other handle for the guy – was on his feet and moving toward the killer and Sandy wondered, What’s he think he’s going to do with that little pop gun? and then it went off and after the dainty little phuts of the killer’s guns the sound was like a cannon in the confines of the subway car and the bullet must have caught the killer in the shoulder because that was where his fatigue jacket exploded in red, knocking him back and spinning him half around. He screamed in pain and stared with eyes full of shock and wonder and fear at this guy coming at him from out of nowhere. Sandy couldn’t see the GPM’s face as he worked the slide to his pistol again, just the back of his head and not much of that thanks to the knit cap, but he did see the woman who’d been the next intended victim crawl out from where she’d been cowering on the floor and scrabble past the dude on her belly, her teary eyes showing white all around, her lipsticked mouth a scarlet O of terror.

Then the killer started to raise the gun in his good hand but the GPM was still moving toward him like an eagle swooping in on a field mouse, had that little pistol raised and it boomed again, the recoil jerking his hand high in the air, the second bullet detonating another explosion of red, this time in the killer’s other shoulder, knocking him back against one of the chrome hang-on poles in the center of the aisle where he sagged, both arms limp and useless at his sides, and gaped at the relentless man moving ever closer. He roared and lunged forward, whether to head-butt or bite the GPM no one would ever know, because without pausing, without the slightest hint of hesitation the GPM leveled that toy pistol at the killer’s left eye and let it boom again. Sandy saw the killer’s head snap back and the impact swing him halfway around the pole before he lurched free to do a loose-kneed pirouette and collapse half-sitting, half sprawled against one of the doors, very, very, very dead.

And then the GPM was working the little slide on his little gun again, and a fourth boom, this into the tape player, reducing it to a thousand flying black fragments and stopping its incessant cries about time having come today.

Stunned silence in the car after that final report – only the rattle of the wheels and the whistle of the wind racing past.

Saved!

The word batted around the inside of Sandy’s head, bouncing off the walls, looking for purchase on the disbelieving, rejecting surfaces. Finally it landed and took root as Sandy accepted the glorious possibility that he would see tomorrow.

And he wasn’t alone. Cheers and cries of joy arose from the multitude packed like sardines at the rear of the car. Some were on their knees, tears on their faces and hands raised to heaven, thanking whoever or whatever they called god for deliverance; others were laughing and crying and hugging each other.

“We’re alive!” the film student under him said. “What–?”

Abashed, Sandy rolled off of her. “Sorry.”

She sat up and stared at him. “God, I can’t believe you did that!”

“Please,” he said, looking away to hide his shame. He saw the GPM in a crouch, picking up something from the floor, but couldn’t focus on what he was doing. Sandy had to frame an answer. How could he explain the terror that had taken control of him? “I don’t know what came over me. I–”

“You shielded me with your own body!”

What? He turned and found her staring at him, her chocolate-brown eyes wide and wonder-filled.

“I’ve heard of it and, you know, seen it in films, but I never believed – I mean, you were like some Secret Service Agent!”

And then her face screwed up and she started to cry… huge racking sobs that shook her fragile body.

Sandy’s befuddled brain finally registered that she thought he’d knocked her down and landed on her to protect her. What did he say to that?

But before he could respond he heard a voice call out behind him.

“We’ve got a lady who’s still alive here! Somebody get up here and help her!”

Sandy turned and saw that the GPM had turned to face the rest of the car, but he’d first stretched his knit cap down to his chin. The effect might have been comical but for that deadly little pistol still clutched in his hand. What was going on here? A few moments ago he’d had his face out in the open for everyone to see. Why hide it now?

“Come on!” he shouted through the weave. “Someone move their ass up here, goddamn it!”

A young black woman with cornrowed hair, wearing white pants and a blue sweater stepped forward.

“I’m an OR tech. I know a little–”

“Well, come on then! Maybe you can save one of your fellow ewes!”

She edged forward, giving Sandy an uneasy look as she slipped past him and hurried to a woman who was moaning and clutching her bloody head. He understood her uncertainty. What he didn’t understand was the anger in the GPM’s voice.

“Why me?” the man shouted. “Why do I have to save your sorry asses? I don’t know you, I don’t care about you, I want nothing to do with you, so why me? Why did I get stuck with it?”

“Hey, mister,” said a tall lean black fellow who could have been a minister, “why you so riled at us? We didn’t do nothing.”

“Exactly! That’s the problem! Why didn’t one of you put him down?”

“We didn’t have no gun!” someone else said.

“And this creep knew that. He knew he’d be dealing with a herd of human sheep. Losers! You make me sick – all of you!”

This was scary. The dude seemed almost as crazy now as the mass murderer he’d just killed. Sandy was beginning to wonder whether they’d traded one maniac for another when the train roared into the Seventy-second Street station. He saw the GPM pocket his pistol and turn toward the door. As soon as the panels parted he leaped through and dashed across the platform. In a flash he was lost among the crowd.

Find the rest here… Hosts

August

The Haunted Air

(Harry Morris’s mind-blowing endpaper

from the limited edition)

With The Haunted Air I got to do a haunted-house/ghost story. I also got to reference The Keep and foretell Reprisal. (Menalaus Manor is the same house where Danny was found.)

My working title was Spirits (I have a thing for plural nouns as titles) but then I came across a passage from Lamia by Keats that nailed the story:

Philosophy will clip an Angel's wings,
Conquer all mysteries by rule and line,
Empty the haunted air, and gnomèd mine…

Have you noticed what’s been going on in the series? I’ve done a techy thriller, a conspiracy novel, a medical thriller, an SF novel, and now a pure horror story. But they’re all Repairman Jack tales. I’m genre hopping within my series. So. Much. Fun.

I decided to throw Jack a curve ball with Gia’s pregnancy. I had no idea how he (or I) would deal with it, but I saw great story potential there. (Well, I hoped.)

The Curio Shoppe is a tip of the hat to Theodore Sturgeon’s wonderful fantasy short, “Shottle Bop”… about a store that sells bottles… “with things in them.”

I think I succeeded in making the haunted parts, well, haunted. Here’s one…

The Haunted Air

(sample)

Lyle awoke to the sound of running water. His room was dark, the windows open to the night, and somewhere…

The shower.

“Now what?” he muttered as he pulled the sheet aside and hung his legs over the edge of the bed.

He blinked and brought the display of his clock radio into focus: 1:21. He stared dully at the red LED digits. He felt drugged. He’d been way down in deep, deep sleep and his brain and body were still fumbling back to alertness. As he watched the display, the last digit changed to a zero.

1:20?

But just a few seconds ago it had been… or at least he’d thought it had been…

Never mind. The shower was running. He jumped off the bed and hurried to the adjoining bathroom.

Lyle felt the steam before he saw it. He fumbled along the wall, found the light switch, and flipped it on. Billows of moisture filled the bathroom, so thick he could barely find his way. He made it to the shower and reached out toward the curtain…

And hesitated. Something told him not to pull it open. Maybe one of those premonitions he didn’t believe in, maybe the result of seeing too many horror movies, but he sensed something besides running water behind the curtain.

Feeling suddenly cold despite the enveloping hot mist, Lyle backed away, one step… two…

No. He wasn’t giving into this. With a strangled cry that anticipated the terror of what he might see, Lyle leaped forward and slashed the curtain aside.

He stood there in the steam, gasping, heart pounding, staring at a shower running full blast at max heat. But the spray wasn’t running straight into the tub. It was bouncing against something… something that wasn’t there and yet was. And after the spray struck whatever it was, the water turned red and ran down into the tub to swirl away into the drain.

Lyle closed his eyes, shook his head, then looked again.

The shower continued to run and billow up steam, but the spray now flowed uninterrupted into the tub, and remained clear all the way down to the drain.

What’s happening to me? he thought as he reached in and turned the knob.

And then he sensed someone behind him in the steam.

“Wha–?”

He spun and found no one. But movement to his left caught Lyle’s eye. Something on the big mirror over the sink… dripping lines forming on the moisture-laden glass… connecting into letters… then…

Words.

Who are you?

Lyle could only stare, could only think that this wasn’t happening, he was dreaming again, and pretty soon–

Three more question marks, bigger than the last, added themselves to the end of the question.

Who are you? ? ? ?

“I…I’m Lyle,” he croaked, thinking, It’s a dream, so play along. “Who are you?”

I dont know

“Why are you here?”

The same words were rewritten below.

I dont know. Im scared.

I want to go home

“Where’s home?”

I DONT KNOW

Then something slammed against the mirror with wall-rattling force to create a spider-web shatter the size of a basketball. The lights went out and a blast of cold tore through the bathroom, plunging the climate from rain forest to Arctic Circle. Lyle leaped for the light switch but his bare foot hit a puddle; he slipped and went down just as he heard another booming impact break more of the mirror. Glass confetti peppered him with the third impact. He crouched on his knees with his forehead against the floor, hands clasped over the back of his head as whatever was in the room with him pounded the mirror again and again in a fit of mindless rage.

And then as suddenly as it began, it stopped.

Slowly, cautiously, Lyle raised his head in the echoing darkness. Somewhere in the house – down the hall – he heard running footsteps, and then his brother’s voice.

“Lyle! Lyle, you all right?” The bedroom light came on. “Dear God, Lyle, where are you?”

“In here.”

He rose to his knees but could find neither the strength nor the will to regain his feet. Not yet.

He heard Charlie’s approach and called out, “Don’t come in. There’s glass on the floor. Just reach in and hit the light.”

Lyle was facing away from the doorway. When the light came on he looked over his shoulder and saw a wide-eyed and slack-jawed Charlie staring at him.

“What the fuck–" Charlie began, then caught himself. “Dear Lord, Lyle, what you done?”

Charlie’s use of a word he had expunged from his vocabulary since he’d been born again told Lyle the true depth of his brother’s shock. Looking around, he couldn’t blame him. Glittering slivers and pebbles of glass littered the floor; the big mirror looked as if Shaq had been bouncing a granite basketball against it.

“Wasn’t me.”

“Then who?”

“Don’t know. See if you can find a blanket and throw it on the floor so I can get out of here without making hamburger of my feet.”

While Charlie went looking, Lyle pushed himself to his feet and turned, careful to stay in the glass-free circle of floor under him.

Charlie reappeared with a blanket. “This one pretty thin but–"

He stopped and stared, a look of abject horror stretching his features.

“What?”

Charlie pointed a wavering finger at Lyle’s chest. “Oh, God, Lyle, you – you cut yourself!”

Lyle looked down and felt his knees soften when he saw his T-shirt front soaked in crimson. He pulled up the shirt and this time his knees wouldn’t hold him. They buckled and he crumbled to the floor when he saw the deep gash in his chest, so deep he could see his convulsively beating heart through the opening.

He looked up at Charlie, met his terrified eyes, tried to mouth a word or two but failed. He looked down again at his chest…

And it was whole. Intact. Clean. No hole, no blood, not a drop on his skin or his shirt.

Just like what had happened to Charlie last night.

He looked up at his brother again. “You saw that, right? Tell me you saw it this time.”

Charlie was nodding like a bobble-head doll. “I saw it, I saw it! I thought you was buggin’ last night, but now… I mean, what–?”

“Throw that blanket down. I want to get out of here.”

Charlie held onto one end and tossed the rest toward Lyle. They spread it out atop the glass-littered tile and Lyle crawled – he didn’t trust his legs to support him so he crawled – to the door.

When he reached the carpet Lyle stayed down, huddling, shaking. He wanted to sob, wanted to vomit. Things he’d always disbelieved were proving true. The pillars of his world were crumbling.

“What just happened in there, Lyle?” Charlie said, kneeling beside him and laying an arm across his shaking shoulders. “What this all about?”

Lyle gathered himself, swallowed the bile at the back of his throat, and straightened his spine.

“You know what you said about this house being haunted? I’m beginning to think you’re right.” He looked up at the clock radio which now read 1:11. Who knew how long it had been running backwards. It could be three in the morning for all he knew. “Fuckit, I know you’re right.”

“What we do about it, man?”

Something strange and angry had invaded their house. Was that anger directed at him? At Charlie? He hoped not, because he sensed it ran wide and frighteningly deep. Charlie wanted to know what they were going to do. How could he answer that without even knowing what they were facing?

He grabbed Charlie’s arm and got to his feet.

“I don’t know, Charlie. But I know one thing we’re not doing, and that’s leaving. This is our place now and nobody, living or dead, is chasing us out.”

The rest of the hauntings and sundry mayhem are here… The Haunted Air

September

GATEWAYS

(preliminary study by Harry Morris

for the limited cover)

I decided it was time for a fish-out-of-water story… and more Otherness-twisted humans.

Jack loves NYC and loathes leaving it, so I had to come up with a compelling reason for him to leave. What better than his father hit by a car and in a coma? How can he say no?

I chose a place as unlike NYC as could be: The Florida Everglades. I spent a week down there researching it and it’s beautiful… but the mosquitos! Jack’s not used to horizons and they go one forever there.

He learns all sorts of things about his father (we finally find out what’s in that lock box) and that the apple hasn’t fallen all that far from the tree.

I made the Lady his dad’s neighbor and had a lot of fun with her dog and her name. I think I created some compelling supporting characters to come along for the ride. And of course… Hurricane Elvis.

The things is, how does a man with no official identity board a plane these days. And armed. I mean really, you thing Jack’s gonna let some lame son of a bitch hijack his plane? NFW. So he’s got this ceramic knife taped to his underarm…

GATEWAYS

(sample)

Jack reached the OmniShuttle Airways counter an hour before the next scheduled flight.

Before dropping Gia off, he’d had the cab take him over to Abe’s where he left the package to be overnighted to his father’s place. Abe used a small, exclusive, expensive shipping company that didn’t ask questions. The cab ride had been uneventful, but it felt so odd to be moving about the city without a gun either tucked into the small of his back or strapped to his ankle. He didn’t dare risk trying to sneak one onto the plane, though, even in checked luggage, now that they were x-raying every piece.

The ticket purchase went smoothly: A mocha-skinned woman with an indeterminate accent took the Tyleski Visa card and the Tyleski driver license, punched a lot of keys – an awful lot of keys – then handed them back along with a ticket and a boarding pass. Jack had chosen OmniShuttle because he didn’t want any round-trip-ticket hassles. The airline sold one-way tickets without regard to Saturday stayovers or any of that other nonsense: When you want to go, buy a ticket; when you want to come back, buy another.

Jack’s kind of company.

He asked for an aisle seat but they were all already taken. But he did manage to snag an exit row, giving him more leg room.

He had some time so he treated himself to a container of coffee with a trendoid name like mocha-latte-java-kaka-kookoo or something like that; it tasted pretty good. He bought some gum and then, steeling himself, headed for the metal detectors with their attendant body inspectors.

He made sure to get on the end of the longest line, to give him a chance to see how they conducted the screening process. He noticed that a much higher percentage of the people who set off the metal alarm were taken aside for more thorough screening than the ones who didn’t. Jack wanted to be in the latter category.

This is how a terrorist must feel, he realized. Standing on line, sweating, praying that no one sees through his bogus identity. Except I’m not looking to hurt anyone. I’m just looking to get to Florida.

When it came his time, he placed his bag on the belt and watched as it was swallowed by the maw of the fluoroscope. Then it was his turn to step through the metal detector. He put his watch, change, and keys into a little bowl that was passed around the detector, then stepped through.

His heart skipped a beat and jumped into high gear when a loud beep sounded. Damn!

“Sir, have you emptied your pockets?” said a busty bottle blonde woman in a white shirt with epaulettes, a gold badge, and a name tag that read “Delores.” She was armed with a metal detecting wand. A dozen feet behind her, two security guards stood with carbines slung over their shoulders.

“I thought I did. Let me check again.” He patted his pants pockets front and rear but, except for his wallet, they were empty. He pulled out the wallet. “Could this be the culprit?”

She waved her wand past it without a beep. “No, sir. Step over here, please.”

“What for?”

“I have to wand you.”

When had “wand” become a verb?

“Is something wrong?”

“Probably just your belt buckle or jewelry. Stand here, back to the table. Good. Now spread your legs and raise your arms out from your body.”

Jack assumed the position. The moisture deserting his mouth seemed to be migrating to his palms. She waved the wand up and down the inside and outside of his legs, then across his waist where she got a beep from his belt buckle – no problem – and then she started on his arms. Right one first – inside and outside, okay; then the left – outside okay, but a loud beep as the wand approached his armpit.

Oh shit, oh hell, oh Christ. Abe you promised me, you swore to me the knife would pass the detectors. What’s happening?

Without moving his head, Jack checked out the two security guards from the corner of his right eye. They looked bored, and certainly weren’t paying attention to him. To his left a handful of unarmed security personnel were busy screening – wanding – other travelers. He could barrel past them and dash back out into the terminal, but where to go from there? His chances of escaping were nil, he knew, but he damn well wasn’t simply going to stand here and put his hands out for the cuffs. If they wanted him, they were going to have to catch him.

“Sir?”

“Hmmm? What?” Jack could feel the sweat breaking out on his forehead. Had she noticed?

“I said, do you have anything in your breast pocket?”

“My–?”

He jammed his hand into the pocket and came out with his package of Dentyne Ice. Gum in a blister pack… sealed with foil…

She ran her wand over it and was rewarded with a beep. She took the pack, opened it to make sure it was only gum, then dropped it on the table. The rest of the wanding was beepless.

The future that had been telescoping closed at warp-11 now opened wide again. Feeling as giddy as a man with a reprieve from death row, Jack retrieved his watch, keys, and chain, but he left the damn gum. It had put him on a train to heart attack city. Let Delores have it.

As he hefted his gym bag strap onto his shoulder he fought an urge to ask Delores if she wanted to inspect that too. Inspect anything you want! The mad inspectee strikes again!

But he said nothing, contenting himself with a friendly nod as he started toward his gate. He reached it with just enough time to make a quick to call Gia.

“I made it,” he said when she answered. “I board the plane in a couple of minutes.”

“Thank God! Now I won’t have to figure out how to bake a cake with a file inside.”

“Well, there’s still the flight home.”

“Let’s not think about that yet. Call me when you’ve seen your father, and let me know how he is.”

“Will do. Love ya.”

“Love you too, Jack. Very much. Just be careful. Don’t talk to strangers or go riding in strange cars, or take candy from–"

“Gotta run.”

He wound up in a window seat in the left emergency row with the perfect traveling companion: the guy fell asleep before takeoff and didn’t wake up until they were on the Miami tarmac. No small talk and Jack got to eat the guy’s complimentary bag of peanuts.

The only glitch in the trip was a slight westward alteration of the usual flight path due to tropical storm Elvis. Elvis… when Jack had heard the name announced on TV the other night he’d done a double-take that would have put Lou Costello to shame.

He wondered now if there’d ever been a tropical storm named Elliott. If so, had it been designated on the maps as T.S. Elliott?

Elvis was not expected to graduate to hurricane status, but was presently off the coast near Jacksonville, cruising landward and stirring things up, just as its namesake had in the fifties. Though the plane swung westward to avoid the turbulence, Jack could see it churning away to the east. From his high perch he looked out over the rugged terrain of cloud tops broken dramatically here and there by fluffy white buttes from violent updrafts. Elvis was just entering the building.

You can accompany Jack on his Florida trip here… Gateways

November

Crisscross

(the color version of the

Gauntlet Press chapbook cover)

This is one of the darkest Jack novels… and where the Compendium of Srem makes its first appearance in modern times.

I needed a cult for this, but I wanted to make up my own rather than horn in on someone else’s. I’m a recovering Catholic and don’t understand how they buy into the transubstantiation myth, but they do. I didn’t know if I could sell something that far out, so I started researching and was astounded by what people believe. I’m not talking small-time kook clubs like Heaven’s Gate. Big-time religions too. Mormonism was so obviously built on a scam. And Scientology… wow.

I came up with the Otherness-inspired Dormentalism which has upset many Scientologists who think it’s a swipe at their cult. Well, if the shoe fits…

Authors talk about falling in love with their characters, and that has happened to me. (Weezy Connell, for instance.) But Richie Cordova is the first of my own characters I’ve ever come to loathe. As a result, I had Jack off him in a nasty way. When I looked at the result I wondered if cold-blooded first-degree murder, even for an anti-hero, was going too far. When I later asked readers about it, to a man and a woman they said I didn’t go far enough. As one sweet little woman said, “He shoulda gut shot him and left him. Take him three days to die.” Ooookay. (Gotta love my readers.)

Here Jack meets with a customer (he refuses to call them “clients”) in Julio’s…

CRISSCROSS

(sample)

Jack was late. As he entered the bar, Julio pointed out Maggie – no last name, which was fine with Jack – sitting at a rear table, talking to Patsy. Well, more like listening. Patsy was a semi-regular at Julio’s and a Patsy conversation usually consisted of him talking and the other party trying fruitlessly to get a word in. Jack could see Maggie nodding and looking uncomfortable in the rear dimness.

Jack ambled over and laid a hand on Patsy’s shoulder.

“This guy bothering you, lady?”

Patsy jumped, then smiled when he saw Jack. “Hey, Jacko, how’s it goin’? I been keepin’ her company while she’s waitin’ for you.”

He had a round face and a comb-over that started behind his ear. He wore double-knit slacks and watched the world through aviator glasses day and night, indoors and out. Wouldn’t surprise Jack if he wore them to bed.

“That’s great, Patsy. What a guy. But now we’ve got some private talk, so if you don’t mind…

“Sure, sure.” As he began backing away he pointed to Maggie. “I’ll be at the bar. Think on what I said about dinner.”

Maggie shook her head. “Really, I can’t. I have to be–"

“Just think about it, that’s all I’m askin’.”

Oh, and somehow along the way Patsy had got the idea that he was quite the ladies’ man.

“I wish we didn’t have to meet in a bar,” Maggie said as Patsy sauntered away and Jack pulled up a chair.

With a minimum of effort she could have looked okay. Fortyish with a pale face, so pale that if she told Jack she’d never been out in the sun, he’d believe her. Not a speck of makeup, thin lips, a nice nose, hazel eyes. She’d tucked her gray-streaked blond hair under a light blue knit hat that looked like flapperwear from the Roaring Twenties. As for her body, she appeared slim, but a bulky sweater and shapeless blue slacks smothered whatever moved beneath. Beat-up Reboks completed the picture. She sat stiff and straight, as if her vertebrae had been switched for a steel rod. Her whole look seemed calculated to deflect male attention.

If that was the case, it hadn’t worked with Patsy. But then, Patsy was game for anyone without a Y chromosome.

“You don’t like Julio’s?” Jack said.

“I don’t like bars – I don’t go to them and I don’t think they’re a good thing. Too many wives and children go hungry because of paychecks wasted in places like this, too many are beaten when the drinker comes home drunk.”

Jack nodded. “Can’t argue with you on that, but I don’t think it happens much with these folk.”

“What makes them so special?”

“Most of them are single or divorced. They work hard but don’t have too many people to spend on but themselves. When they go home there’s no one to beat. Or love.”

“What’s wrong with giving their drink money to charity?”

Jack shook his head. This lady was no fun with a capital NO.

“Because they’d rather spend it hanging out with friends.”

“I can think of lots of ways to be with friends besides drinking.”

Jack looked around at the bright afternoon sun angling through the front windows past the bare branches of the dead ficus and the desiccated hanging plants, so long deceased they’d become mummified. Smoke layered the air. “Another Brick in the Wall” wafted from the jukebox, its metronomic beat augmented by Lou’s hammering at the Gopher Bash in the corner.

What’s not to like?

She’d been just as uptight yesterday at their first meeting. He found it hard to believe that this priss was being blackmailed. What had she ever done that would let someone get a hook into her?

Her hands were clasped together on the table before her in an interlocking deathgrip. Jack reached over and gave them a gentle pat.

“I’m not the enemy here, Maggie.”

Her shoulders slumped as she closed her eyes and leaned back. Tears rimmed her lids when she looked at him again.

“I know. I’m sorry. It’s just… it’s just that I’m not a bad person. I’ve been good, I’ve lived a clean life, I’ve sacrificed for others, done good works, given to charity. Criminals, mobsters, drug dealers, they commit crimes every day and go about their lives unscathed. Me, I make one little mistake, just one, and my whole world is threatened.”

If she was telling the truth, and Jack believed she was, he was sorry for her. He couldn’t help responding to the hurt, fright, and vulnerability seeping through her façade.

“That’s because you’ve got something to protect – a job, a family, a reputation, your dignity. They don’t.”

Maggie had been under a blackmailer’s thumb since August. All she would say about the hook was that someone had photos of her that she’d rather not be made public. He’d been squeezing her and she was just about tapped out. She wouldn’t say what was in the photos. She admitted that she was in them, but that was it. Fine with Jack. If he found the blackmailer and the photos, he’d know. If not, none of his business.

“And another difference between you and the sleazeballs is they’ll hunt down a blackmailer and rip his lungs out. You won’t, and this oxygen waster knows it. That’s where I come in.”

Her eyes widened. “I don’t want anyone’s lungs ripped out!”

Jack laughed. “Figure of speech. Probably better than this guy deserves, and it would be way too messy.”

She stared at him a moment, an uneasy light in her eyes, then glanced around. Though no one was in earshot, she lowered her voice.

“The person who gave me your name warned that you played ‘rough.’ I’m against violence. I just want those pictures back.”

“I’m not a hitman,” he told her, “but this guy’s not going to just hand over those pictures, even if I say pretty please. I’ll try to get it done without him knowing who I’m working for, but a little rough and tumble may be unavoidable.”

She grimaced. “Just as long as no lungs are ripped out.”

Jack laughed. “Forget lungs, I want to know who told you I played rough. What’s his name?”

A hint of a smile curved her thin lips. “Who said it was a he?”

She wasn’t going to come across. All right, he’d wait. And watch. Customers without references earned extra scrutiny.

“Okay. First things’ first: Did you bring the first half of my fee?”

She looked away. “I don’t have it all. I had very little money in the first place, and so much of that is gone, used up paying this… beast.” It seemed to take an effort to call her blackmailer a name. Who was this lady? “I was wondering… could I pay you in installments?”

Jack leaned back and stared at her. His impulse was to say, Forget it. He didn’t do this for fun. Too often a fix-it involved putting his skin on the line; might be different if he had a replacement, but this skin was his one and only. So he liked a good portion of his fee up front. Installments meant a continuing relationship, excuses for being late, and on and on. He didn’t want to be a bank, and he didn’t want a long-term customer relationship. He wanted to get in, get out, and say good-bye.

And besides, dealing with a blackmailer could get ugly.

But the twenty-five large nesting in his pocket brought back the previous owner’s words…

Use whatever is left over to offset the fee for someone who can’t afford you…

Maybe a lady who said she did good works and gave to charity deserved a little herself.

Still, he couldn’t bring himself to agree right away.

“Well, like I told you yesterday, this could be a tough job, with no guarantees. Getting your photos isn’t enough. I have to get the negatives as well. But if he used a digital camera, there won’t be any. Digital photos will exist on a hard drive somewhere, and most likely on a backup disk somewhere else. Finding all that will take time. But that’s Stage Two. Stage One is finding out who is blackmailing you.”

She shook her head. “I just can’t imagine…

“Got to be someone who knows you. Once we identify him, we’ll need to steal all copies of whatever it is he’s holding over you without him knowing you were behind it.”

“How can you do that?”

“The ideal scenario is to make it look like an accident – say, a fire. But that’s not always feasible. If you’re not his only victim – I know of one guy who’s made a career out of blackmail – it makes things a little easier.”

“How?”

“I can liberate more than just your stuff.”

“I don’t understand.”

“If he’s got multiple victims and just your stuff winds up missing, he’ll know it was you. If I wipe out everything I find, he’ll have a number of suspects. But even with your stuff gone, he’ll keep trying to squeeze you.”

“But how–?”

“He’ll assume you’ll think he still has the photos. That’s why we have to pave a way out for you.”

“You sound like you’ve done this before.”

He nodded. The blackmail industry kept his phone ringing. Most victims couldn’t go to the cops because that meant revealing the very thing they were paying the leech to keep under wraps. They imagined a trial, their secret trumpeted in the papers, or at the very least making the public record. A certain percentage, pushed to the point where they couldn’t or wouldn’t take it anymore, decided to seek a solution outside the system. That was where Jack came in.

“Many times. Maybe even for your unnamed source.”

“Oh, no. He’d never–" Her hand flew to her mouth.

Gotcha, Jack thought, but didn’t make an issue of it. He’d narrowed down her source to a little less than half the population. At least it was a start.

“As for the installments… we’ll work something out.”

She smiled, this time revealing even white teeth. “Thank you. I’ll see you get your money, every penny of it.” She dug into her black no-name pocketbook. “I was able to bring the hundred dollars you asked for.”

She handed him a hundred-dollar bill and two folded sheets of paper.

Jack slipped the bill under his sweater and into the breast pocket of his shirt. The blackmailer had demanded a thousand as his next payment. He was going to get only a fraction of that. And Jack was going to send it.

He had a reason for doing it himself. But more important, the payment would allow him to track down the blackmailer. He’d done this before: Send the money in a padded envelope with a dime-size transponder hidden in the lining, then follow the transponder.

He unfolded the first sheet of paper – Maggie’s perfect Palmer-method handwritten note saying she didn’t have any more to send at the moment. Good. Just what he’d told her to write. The second was the address. The money was supposed to go to “Occupant.” A street address and a number followed – plainly a mail drop. Jack did a double take at the street – Tremont Avenue in the Bronx… Box 224.

“Son of a bitch!”

“I beg your pardon?”

“I know that address and I know who’s blackmailing you.”

“Who?”

“A walking, talking virus.”

“But what’s his name?”

Jack could see his round, sweaty-jowled face with eyes and mouth crowded close to the center of his face, held there by the gravitational field of his big, pushed-up nose. Richie Cordova, a fat, no good, rotten, useless glob of protoplasm. Not two months ago Jack had ruined most of Cordova’s stash of blackmail goodies. Obviously he’d missed Maggie’s photos.

“Nobody you’d know. He’s the guy I mentioned before, who’s made a career out of blackmail.”

Maggie looked frightened. “But how did he get those pictures of me and…?”

And who? Jack wondered. Male or female?

He had a pretty good idea of how it had gone down. Cordova’s legit grind was private investigations. Someone hired him for a job that had put him in Maggie’s orbit. The shitbum spotted something hinky, took a few pictures, and now was using them to supplement his income.

“Bad luck. The wrong guy in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

She leaned forward. “I want his name.”

“Better you don’t know. It can’t do you any good. Might even buy you some trouble.” He looked at her. “I mean it.”

“Yes, but–"

“You believe in the soul, I assume?”

“Of course.”

“This guy’s is a Petrie dish.”

She slumped again. “This is terrible.”

“Not really. Granted you’ve got a better chance of goof-ups if you’re on the string to an amateur than a pro, but I’ve already dealt with this particular pro. I know where he lives and where he works. I’ll get your photos back.”

She brightened. “You will?”

“Well, maybe I shouldn’t guarantee anything, but we’ve gone from Stage One to Stage Two in a matter of minutes. That’s a record. We still have to send him that money though.”

“Why? I thought that was to trace him. If you already know who he is–"

“There’s a reason we’re shorting him. I want to rattle his cage, make him get in touch with you. When he calls, you’ve got to cry poverty–"

She barked a bitter little laugh. “It won’t be an act, I can tell you that.”

“Be convincing. What that does is set the stage for your sending him no more money when and if I retrieve your photos. You simply haven’t got it. Remember, he’s got a lot invested in his blackmail assets. We don’t want him connecting you to losing them. No telling what he’ll do.”

Instead of looking concerned, Maggie smiled as if a terrible burden had been lifted.

“This is going to work, isn’t it,” she said.

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”

“No, it is. I can feel it. God turned away from me for a while – not without good reason – but now I see His hand again in my life. He led me to you, to someone who has already dealt with my tormentor. That can’t be just a coincidence.”

Coincidence…

Jack felt his shoulders tighten. He hated coincidences.

Read the rest here…Crisscross

December

INFERNAL

(one of Harry Morris’s studies for the

limited edition wraparound cover)

In Hosts we met Jack’s sister; his father in Gateways. And now his brother, Tom, Jr. – the anti-Jack. Jack saw one of the Seven Infernals as a teen. Now he gets up close and personal with another – the creepy Lilitongue of Gefreda.

Infernal is the least favorite of a number of Jack fans. I think because they didn’t like his brother. (Let’s face it, Jack isn’t a fan of Tom either.) He’s everything Jack isn’t. He has no code.

But I think the most off-putting thing about the book is the scene at LaGuardia Airport where his father, Tom, Sr., is gunned down.

Yep. And that’s not a spoiler because it’s the opening scene. I received a ton of emails at the website and comments in the forum which can be summed up with “WTF? I can’t believe you did that!”

I didn’t do it for the shock value. There is a reason, which I make clear in the next book, Harbingers, and have been hinting at since Hosts.

Ready? Here goes…

INFERNAL

(sample)

1

As Tom watched Jack thread the crowd toward the stairs, trailing his carry-on, someone opened an exit door. A gust of cold December air sneaked through and wrapped around him. He shivered. Now he knew why he’d moved to Florida.

He returned his attention to the still and empty baggage carousel. A moment or two later a klaxon sounded as an orange light began blinking; the carousel shuddered into motion.

As luggage started to slide down a chute to the revolving surface Tom edged forward with everyone else, looking for his bag. It was black, like ninety percent of the rest, but he’d wrapped the handle in day-glo orange tape to make it easier to spot.

One of the Hasidic women stood in front of him, carrying a one-year old. A little girl, bundled head to toe against winter. Her large brown eyes fixed on Tom and he gave her a little wave. She smiled and covered her face. A shy one.

From the corner of his eye he saw a door swing open on the far side of the carousel. Two figures emerged but he paid them no mind until he heard the unmistakable ratchet of a breech bolt. He froze, then spun toward the doorway in time to see two figures in gray coveralls, ski-masked under black-and-white kufiyas, raising assault pistols.

Instinct and training took over as Tom dove for the floor, carrying the mother and her little girl with him. The woman cried out, and as the three of them fell, her fat, bearded husband in his long black coat and sealskin hat whirled toward them, his face a mask of shock and outrage.

Then the shooting began and the man dove floorward along with everybody else.

Tom heard shattering glass and a scream of pain behind him. He turned in time to see the two security guards go down, caught in a spray of bullets that shattered the glass doors behind them. The woman’s legs folded under her and she hit the floor not six feet from him. A pulsating crimson fountain arced from her throat. He saw more shock than pain in her eyes. She’d never had a chance to draw her pistol.

The shooters seemed to have made a point of taking down the guards first. More would be coming, but for the moment the killers were unopposed. They mowed down anyone trying to run, and then began a systematic slaughter of the rest.

Tom watched in horror as the two faceless gunmen split, each taking a side of the carousel, tearing up the helpless, cowering passengers with a succession of short bursts from their stubby, odd-looking assault pistols. They worked quickly and methodically, pausing only to change magazines or cut down those who tried to flee.

Tom’s gut writhed and his bladder clenched with the realization that he was going to die here. He’d been shot in Korea, he’d survived the firefight of his life and Hurricane Elvis just a few months ago, only to be exterminated here like a roach trapped on the floor. If only he had a gun – even a .22 pistol – he could stop these arrogant murderous shits. They knew no one could fight back.

Tom turned. The dead guard’s pistol beckoned to him from its holster.

Just then a man leaped up and tried to dive into the baggage chute, but an extended burst cut him nearly in half, leaving his body wedged in the opening.

That long burst emptied the killer’s magazine. As he switched to a fresh one, a brawny Hasid leaped to his feet and charged, roaring like the bear he resembled. The killer, caught off guard, backpedaled and slipped on the bloody floor. The Hasid was almost upon him when the other killer turned and ripped him up with a burst to the chest and abdomen that sent him spinning to the floor.

Now! Tom thought, not giving himself time to think as he pushed himself up to a crouch and started a high-assed scramble. Now!

He heard shooting behind him, saw pieces chip out of the floor as bullets hit it, felt something tear into his thigh. It knocked him flat, but pushed him forward as it did, putting the gun within reach. He heard the hollow clink! of an empty chamber and knew with a sudden burst of hope that the shooter’s magazine had run dry. Bolts of agony shot through his leg when he tried to move it, but he’d been hurt worse than this. All that mattered was the pistol. He had a tiny window of opportunity here and had to make the most of it.

His fingers were closing around the grip when he began to shake. Not just his hand and arms, his whole body. He tried again for the pistol but his arm seized up. He couldn’t breathe. He felt his body begin to flop around like a beached fish. His pulse pounded in his ears, slowing.

What was happening? He’d only been hit in the leg. Had he taken another slug somewhere else? What…?

Tom’s light, his air, his questions, his time… faded to nothingness.

2

Jack had to take a circular route to reach the pickup area, a reluctant mini-tour of the airport. LaGuardia was small as major airports went, and appeared to be the victim of some weird temporal dislocation. The dingy, Quonset-hut style hangers looked to be of 1930s vintage, while a green-glassed terminal itself was strictly fifties in design. The massive, six-story bare concrete parking garage could have been built yesterday.

As he nosed his Crown Vic along the pickup lane outside the Central Terminal, he saw people running – not toward the doors, like late travelers, but from them. Screaming people, faces masks of terror, fleeing for their lives.

Jack’s heart double clutched. They were pouring from the baggage area… fleeing the far section… the section where he’d left Dad.

No… it can’t…

He gunned the engine and sped toward the far section, narrowly missing a panicked man and a screaming woman. He jerked to a halt when he saw the shattered doors and broken glass glittering on the sidewalk, the bullet holes in the still-intact panes.

Oh, Christ… oh no-no-no!

He jumped out and dashed across the sidewalk, almost slipping on the shards of glass, and skidded to a halt inside the baggage area.

Blood… blood everywhere… lakes of red on the floor… even the carousel was red… a man’s feet and legs hung out of the baggage chute… the bloody rag-doll body of a baby girl sprawled among the endlessly circling luggage.

No other movement, no crying, no screams or wails of the wounded. Just silence. Not one of the victims so much as stirred.

Jack stood frozen and stared, numb, paralyzed…

Dad…?

Where was his father? He’d left him standing right over there by the –

There! Shit! A body, a gray-haired man in a green-and-white coat.

No-no-no-no!

As Jack forced himself forward a voice shouted from somewhere to his left.

“Freeze!”

Jack heard the word but it didn’t register. Stiff and slow, he kept moving, a living zombie.

“Freeze, goddammit or I’ll drop you where you stand!”

Jack kept moving, forcing himself forward a few more steps until he reached the corpse. He dropped to his knees in a pool of still-warm blood, grabbed one of the shoulders, and rolled him over.

The face – his lips were pulled back in a horrific, agonized grimace, but his glazed eyes left no doubt about it.

Dad.

Dead.

Jack felt as if his chest might explode. He let out a sound that was equal parts moan and sob.

He shook his father. It couldn’t be. They’d been talking just a few minutes ago. He couldn’t be dead!

“Dad! Dad, it’s me, Jack! Can you hear me?”

The voice said, “Are you fuckin’ deaf? I told you to freeze!”

Jack looked up into the muzzle of a pistol held by a mustached security guard.

“This… this is my father.”

“I don’t give a fuck, I told you to–"

“That will be enough!”

An older man had come up behind the guard. He looked to be about fifty and wore a blue NYPD uniform with sergeant stripes. His nameplate read Driscoll.

The guard backed off a step. “I found this guy wandering around. He could be–"

Sergeant Driscoll’s voice dripped scorn. “He wasn’t wandering around. I saw him come in. He was looking for someone.” His eyes dropped to Jack father’s inert form. “And he found him.”

“But–"

“But nothing.” He shoved the guard away. “Get over by the door in case anyone else tries to wander in.”

The guard moved off.

Driscoll muttered, “Asshole,” then squatted beside Jack. “Look, I’m sorry about your dad, but you’ve got to go outside.”

“What happened?” His own voice sounded far away. “I left him here just a few minutes ago… we were talking about going to the Empire State Build–"

“I’m really sorry, but you’re going to have to wait outside. This whole area is a crime scene and you’re contaminating it, so you’ve got to leave.”

“But–"

He pointed to the floor beneath Jack. “Look at what you’re kneeling in. If we’re gonna catch these guys, we need every scrap of evidence we can get.” He slipped a hand into Jack’s armpit and lifted. “Come on. If you want to help us catch the fucks who did this to your dad, wait outside.”

The cop’s touch lit a flicker of rage that flashed through the dead, dumb grayness that filled Jack, but he quickly doused it. Lashing out at this man who was trying to do the decent thing would solve nothing. He could walk away or be carried away; either way, he’d be leaving his dad behind. And if he was carried away, they’d find his ankle holster and the unregistered AMT .380 it held.

So he let the cop help him to his feet and shuffled toward the shattered doorway where the security guard stood.

He watched Jack’s approach.

“Hey, sorry about back there. Case like this, you don’t know who’s friend or foe.”

Jack nodded without making eye contact.

Outside – chaos. EMS trucks screeching to a halt, shuttles trying to get out of the way, limos inching out from the curb, hundreds of people milling about, some weeping, some hysterical, some in slack-faced shock.

He saw a harried-looking cop standing by the Vic, shouting, “One last time: Who owns this?”

Jack hesitated, unsure of what he might be getting himself into, then decided that stepping forward would be less complicated, especially since his fingerprints were all over the car and it was registered in someone else’s name – someone unaware of that.

Jack waved and hurried toward the cop. “Me! It’s mine!”

“Then move it! You’re blocking the – hey, you hurt?”

“What?”

He pointed to Jack’s legs. “You’re bleeding.”

Jack looked down and saw the wet red splotches on his knees. For a few seconds, he didn’t understand. Then–

“No…” His voice caught. “No, that’s my father’s.”

“Jesus. He all right?”

Jack wanted to tell him what a stupid fucking question that was but bit it back. He simply shook his head.

“Listen, I’m sorry.” The cop pointed to the Vic. “But ya still gotta move it. Just drive it into the garage. Then you can come back and wait with the rest.”

“Wait for what?” Dad was dead.

The cop shrugged. “I dunno. News about survivors, I guess. Not like you gotta choice. Airport’s locked down. Nobody out, nobody in.”

Jack said nothing as he slipped behind the wheel and pulled away.

Read on…Infernal

January

Harbingers

Harbingers is spoiler city for the Repairman Jack series. You really should read the first nine books in the main sequence (from The Tomb onward) before tackling this. Otherwise you miss those pleasant little epiphanies (“So that’s why that happened!” or “So that’s what it meant!”) sprinkled throughout the story.

It starts off routinely enough…

HARBINGERS

(sample)

Jack hopped out of the cab at Hudson and Worth and looked around. He hadn’t taken time to change. Kept the jeans and beat-up bomber jacket he’d worn to the doctor’s. He noticed a bearded guy on the corner. A ragged-cut square of cardboard with a crudely printed message dangled from his neck.

MICKY MOUSE STOLE MY CAR

NEED $$ TO GO TO ORLANDO

AND KICK HIS ASS

The guy could have been anywhere from forty to seventy. A flap-eared cap covered much of his head. A dirty, gray, Leland Sklar-class beard hid pretty much everything else. He wore what looked like a dozen layers of sweaters and coats, none of which had seen the inside of a washing machine since the Koch administration. He jiggled the change in the blue-and-white coffee container clutched in his gloved hand.

Louie had said look for a beard hanging around Worth and Hudson. This could be him.

“Cool sign,” Jack said. “How’s it working for you?”

“A gold mine,” he said without inflection. He kept his eyes straight ahead. “Get ’em to smile and they part with some change.”

“Mickey’s got an ‘e’ in it.”

Still no look. “So I been told.”

“You Rico?”

Now he looked. “Yeah. You Jack?”

“Hear you saw something.”

“Maybe. Heard there was a reward for finding a red-haired kid, so I been keeping my eyes open.”

“And?”

“Follow me.”

He led Jack around a couple of corners, then stopped across the street from an ancient five-story, brick-fronted building.

“I seen three guys carrying a red-haired girl through the cellar door over there.”

The building looked deserted. The scaffolding and boarded-up windows said remodeling in progress.

Rico said, “Lucky thing I was looking that way because it happened so fast I’d’a missed it.”

This didn’t sound good, even if she wasn’t Timmy’s niece.

“What was she wearing?”

“Couldn’t tell. Had her wrapped up in a sheet but I saw her head. Had Little Orphan Annie hair.”

Jack pulled out Cailin’s photo.

“This her?”

“Never saw her face, but the hair’s pretty much the same.”

“When did all this go down?”

“Soon as it started gettin’ dark.”

“I mean what time?”

“Ain’t got no watch, mister.”

Jack did. He checked it: 5:30. Full dark now. Sunset came between four-thirty and five these days, but the streets started to murk up before that. She could have been in there for an hour or more.

“Struggling?”

“Nope. Looked asleep. Or dead maybe.”

Cailin or not, he’d have to go take a look. As he stepped toward the curb Rico grabbed his arm.

“Don’t I get my money?”

“If it’s the right girl, yeah.”

“How’s about a little advance? I’m a tad short.”

Jack nodded toward the sign. “I thought that was a gold mine.”

“Traffic’s been light. C’mon, man.”

Jack fished out a ten and gave it to him. Rico checked it, then grinned, showing both his mustard-colored teeth.

“Bless you, sir! I’m gonna use this to buy me a nice bowl of hot chili!”

Jack had to smile as he crossed the street.

Right.

He approached the rusty, wrought-iron railing that guarded the stone steps to the cellar. He leaned over for a look. Light filtered around the edges of the chipped and warped door at the bottom. But no window.

He stepped back and looked around. To his right he saw an alley just wide enough for a garbage can. In fact, two brimming cans stood back to back at the building line. Behind them, faint yellow light oozed from a small, street-level window. The alley dead ended at a high brick wall.

Jack placed a hand against each of the sidewalls and levered himself over the garbage cans, then knelt by the window. He wiped off the layer of grime and peered through. Took him a few seconds to orient himself, to make sense out of what he was seeing.

“Shit.”

A naked red-haired, teenage girl was strapped to a long table. Jack didn’t need to pull out the photo again. He recognized her. Cailin wasn’t moving. Her eyes were closed. Could have been dead, but the duct tape over her mouth said otherwise. Didn’t need to gag a corpse. She looked unharmed.

Three lean, shaggy-haired men dressed in jeans and sweatshirts hovered around her. Two stood watching as the third drew on her skin. Looked like he was using a black Sharpie to trace weird freeform outlines all over her body. The pattern reminded Jack of Maori tattoos, but much more extensive.

On the wall behind them someone had painted an inverted pentacle in a circle.

Jack nudged the window and felt it move. Slowly, carefully, he eased it inward but it wouldn’t pass the inch mark.

“Come on, Bob,” said one of the watchers. “What’s taking so long?”

“Yeah,” said the other. “Get it fucking done.”

“Get off my back!” Bob said. “This has got to be done right! I do a half-assed job, it’s all for nothing.”

“Nothing?” The first one nudged the second and grinned as he stared at Cailin’s naked body. “Oh, I wouldn’t say that.”

The second guy thought that was real funny.

Someone needed to bring this party to a screeching halt. The window was too small to fit through, but he could pull his Glock and break the glass. Or he could go around front and kick in the door.

He’d promised Gia to stay arm’s length and do the 9-1-1 thing, but he couldn’t count on the cops getting here in time. Had to go in.

He’d reached the garbage cans and was just about to hop over them when a big black Chevy Suburban chirped to a halt at the curb before the building. Jack ducked as three men dressed in black fedoras, black suits, black ties, and white shirts stepped out. Despite the darkness, all wore sunglasses. They were either trying to look like the Blues Brothers or the mythical Men in Black from UFO lore.

Or like the two similar-looking characters Jack had dealt with last spring.

The three made a disparate group. One was huge, one short and skinny, one somewhere between.

They looked like they knew where they were going as they crossed the sidewalk and hurried down the cellar stairs. When Jack heard them kick in the door, he scrambled back to the window.

The trio with the girl had heard the sound of the door – how could they not? – and drawn long knives.

The three men in black burst in with drawn pistols.

“Who the fuck’re you?” said the artist.

The big guy pointed a suppressed H-K Tactical at him and fired. The bullet hit him in the nose and flung him back against the table. He hung there against Cailin’s body, then slithered to the floor, very dead. The other two immediately dropped their knives and raised their hands. But the big guy wasn’t impressed. With no hesitation and no sign of emotion he shot each once in the head.

Phut!

Phut!

“Damn you, Miller!” the middle-size guy shouted. “What’d you do that for? What’s the matter with you?”

Miller holstered his pistol. “Just improving the gene pool.”

“What about the plan? Tag them and track them, see where they hang out. See if there’s any more like them. Remember that? Ever occur to you that they might have been useful alive?”

“Buncha fucktards. Nothing useful ever coming from them.” The corners of his mouth curled up in a barely noticeable smile. “Least not now anyways.”

The medium guy shook his head. “All right, let’s wrap her up and get her out of here.”

“Let Zeklos do it. He’s gotta be good for something.”

The third, a buck-toothed weasel guy, shot him a venomous look, then approached Cailin.

What the hell?

Jack could still call the police, but the group would be long gone before they got here. Besides, he wanted to know what was going on. Who were these guys? And what did they plan to do with Cailin?

He pulled a knit cap from his jacket pocket. Had an idea of how to find out.

Who were those masked men? Find out here… Harbingers

Infernal Night

(with Heather Graham)

Face Off is an anthology of series characters, um, facing off. Jack was paired with Heather Graham’s Michael Quinn and it worked out well because each is experienced in otherworldly problems.

The story is connected to the Secret History because it involves one of the Seven Infernals listed in the Compendium of Srem (the book, not the story).

For a reason I can’t fully explain, I added Madame de Medici, a character who appeared more than a century ago in three Sax Rohmer stories. I find her fascinating, mostly because of what Rohmer does not tell us about her. I mean, she may not be completely human. She makes a double cameo here, but I would love to play with her at length someday.

Here’s how the story starts…

INFERNAL NIGHT

(with Heather Graham)

(sample)

Jack wandered the room as they spoke.

Okay, so Jules, the last surviving member of the Chastain family, was rich. If the private Gulfsteam V that had flown him down here from LaGuardia and the Maybach with the liveried driver that had picked him up at the airport weren't enough, the sprawling New Orleans mansion provided sufficient backup.

Moss-draped oaks had swayed in the breeze to either side of the house as the driver let him out in front. “The Garden District,” he’d said. Jack had no idea what that meant, but the neighborhood spoke of genteel wealth, of a time forgotten, of slow grace and a distant era. For all Jack knew, the manor house itself might have been a plantation once. With those massive pillars lining the front porch, it reminded him of Tara from Gone with the Wind.

He’d had done a little research before agreeing to come south. Jules Chastain had acquired his wealth the old-fashioned way: He’d inherited it.

And the guy knew people. Famous people. Newspaper clippings and original photos of Chastain with George W., with Obama, with Streisand, with Little Richard – now that was cool – lined the walls between ancient artifacts from all over the world. Jack had lots of artifacts around his apartment too, but mostly from the 1930s and 40s. These were like from pre-pyramid days.

I could be impressed, he thought.

He'd probably be definitely impressed if this guy was talking sense.

He stopped his wandering to face Chastain where he sat in some kind of throne-of-swords chair – only this wasn't a movie prop. With his thin mustache, thick glasses, and ridiculous silk smoking jacket, he looked like Percy Dovetonsils on crack instead of martinis.

"Let me get this straight: You flew me all the way down here from New York to steal something you own from your family crypt."

"Yes," he said in a quavery voice. "Exactly."

"Okay. Now, since you're not crippled in any way I can see, go over again why you can't do this yourself."

"As I explained, the artifact I seek was obtained from another collector who wants it back."

"Because you stole it."

"Mister – I never got your last name."

Jack had had dozens over the years.

"Just Jack'll do."

"Very well, Jack, I assure you I can pay for anything I desire. Anything."

"Not if the other guy doesn't want to sell."

He glanced away. "Well, occasionally one runs into bullheaded stubbornness–"

"Which obliges one to steal."

He waved a dismissive hand. "Oh, very well. Yes. I… appropriated it without the owner's knowledge."

"And the owner wants it back."

"Yes, she discovered the… appropriation."

He seemed incapable of saying "theft."

"Oh, a she. You never mentioned that."

“Madame de Medici. You’ve heard of her?”

“I hadn’t heard of you until you called me, so why should I have heard of her?”

“Just wondering. You’re familiar with the expression ‘Hell hath no fury’?”

“It’s ‘Heav'n has no Rage like Love to Hatred turn'd, Nor Hell a Fury like a Woman scorn'd.’”

Chastain’s eyebrows rose. “Oh, a poetry fan.”

“Not necessarily. Just like to get things right. I had the misfortune of being an English major once.”

“Really? What school?”

“The name doesn’t matter once you’ve dropped out.”

Chastain gave a little smile. “No, I guess it doesn’t.”

“You were saying?”

“Well, if the true quote is ‘Nor Hell a Fury like a Woman scorn'd,’ then in this case we’ve got ‘Nor Hell a Fury like a de Medici missing a piece from her collection.’ When I told her I didn’t have her absent artifact, she went out and hired a hit man to kill me on sight.”

Jack had to laugh. “What is she? A mob wife?”

“Despite the name, she appears to be a Middle Easterner. The point is, she wants me dead.”

Over the years, during the course of business, Jack had ended more than a few lives, but never on contract.

“Well, I hope you don’t think I’m going to hit her, because that’s not in my job description.”

“No-no! As I said, I just need someone to retrieve the artifact from the family mausoleum.”

“And you need a guy from New York for this? Why not somebody local?”

“I was told you are – what did he call you? – an urban mercenary. Yes, an urban mercenary with a reputation for getting the job done and being a man of his word.”

“Where’d you hear all this?”

“I’m not sure the individual would like me talking about him. Let’s just say you’ve had the benefit of an enthusiastic referral and leave it at that.”

Jack wondered who it might be. He didn’t know anyone in New Orleans. He shrugged it off. With the Internet, the source could be anywhere.

“Still, there must be a local guy who can–”

“You also have a reputation for not being afraid of violence. That is, if attacked, you will counterattack rather than run.”

“Oh, don’t go there. I’ve done my share of running. What else have you heard about me?”

Chastain frowned. “Very little. I made numerous queries. You don’t seem to have an official existence. Some sources even said you don’t exist at all. That Repairman Jack is just some urban legend.” His eyebrows lifted. “Interesting name, that.”

Jack had never liked the tag but things had progressed far past the point where he could do anything about it.

“Not my idea. Someone laid it on me and it stuck.”

As for the urban legend angle, that was fine with Jack. His favorite method was to play someone and leave them with no clue they’d been played. Those people never talked about Repairman Jack, just a terrible run of bad luck. But fixes didn’t always go as planned, of course, and sometimes things got dicey. Sometimes people got violent. Sometimes people died. Those people never talked about Repairman Jack either.

Chastain rose and stepped to a window that had to be a dozen feet high.

“Well, whatever,” he said as he stared out at the night. “The thing is, with a hit man after me, I need someone who can overcome any resistance, retrieve the artifact in question, and bring it back. Too many locals would forget about that last part.”

“With a hit man after me, I wouldn’t be standing at a window.”

Chastain stiffened, then ducked to the side.

“I am so stupid at times,” he said, drawing the curtains across the panes. “I’m not geared for this kind of situation. That’s why I need you.”

Jack still wasn’t buying.

“But the simple solution is to call this Medici lady and say it’s in the mausoleum and tell her to go get it.”

Chastain’s hands flew into the air. “I would if I could! I’ve tried but she’s gone off the radar! Incommunicado! And I fear the longer I wait, the shorter I’ll live. If I can just get the artifact back in my hands, I can eventually negotiate a settlement. But I’m afraid to set foot outside the door.”

Something not right here. Customers had tried to run games on him before. Was this another?

“How do I know you’re not setting me up to steal this from her?”

He laughed. “It is in the Chastain Mausoleum on the old Chastain plantation! It’s got my family name on it! I’ll show you a back way in–”

“Why do I need a back way in if it’s yours?”

“Take the front way if you wish. It’s just that I fear Madame de Medici’s hit man might suspect I’ll show up there and be lying in wait.”

Jack pulled his Glock from the small of his back – traveling armed was a sweet perk of a private jet – and aimed it at Chastain’s face. “No need to lie in wait when you had him driven in from the airport.”

Chastain’s eyes were fixed on the pistol as he backed away. “What? No!”

“Madame de Medici offered me twice your fee.” Jack shrugged. “You got played.”

“This is impossible!”

“Quite possible.” Jack returned the pistol to its nylon holster. “But not true… this time.”

Chastain sagged against the desk. “Why would you do such a thing?”

“Had my reasons.”

He’d wanted to see Chastain’s reaction, and it hadn’t been what he’d expected.

“That was cruel!” he said, dropping back into his desk chair.

“Naw. Just serving up a dose of reality. So, just what is this artifact?” Jack pointed to some huge Olmec stone head in a corner. “Not something like that, is it?”

Hysteria tinged Chastain’s twittering laugh. “Oh, goodness no! It’s a ring – an ancient ring. I’ve drawn a diagram of the interior of the mausoleum so you can find the hiding place.”

Jack didn’t like this, any of it. But Chastain had called while Gia and Vicky were back in Iowa visiting her folks and he felt the need for a brief change of scenery. A fat fee, round-trip transportation to New Orleans in a private jet… it had all sounded too good to be true.

And naturally that was how it was turning out.

Hit man…sheesh. He hadn’t bargained for that. But if he could sneak in and sneak back out of this mausoleum with no one being the wiser, everything would be cool. He’d stop by the French Quarter for a fried-oyster po’ boy and then be on his way.

“All right, let’s get this over with. Money up front – all of it.”

“Certainly.” Chastain reached for an envelope on a nearby table in the shape of an elephant. “Cash in hundreds, as agreed.” Another one of those Percy Dovetonsils smiles. “I take it Uncle Sam won’t be seeing any of that.”

Jack said nothing as he pocketed the envelope. He wouldn’t know a 1040 if it poked him in the eye.

Chastain said, “I was concerned you might not be armed, but no longer. I’ll have my man drive you over to the plantation and–”

“You’ll show me how to get there, then have your man drive me to where I can hail a cab.”

Arrive in a silver Maybach Landaulet. Right, that would work. No, he take the most beat-up cab he could find.

“Very well. But be prepared for deadly force.”

“Uh-huh. Got a map?”

After watching Chastain trace a path along the Mississippi to the location of his old family plantation on River Road, Jack let himself out onto the front porch to wait for the car. He stood between two of the massive columns, staring out at the misty night and listening to his forebrain playing the Clash’s “Should I Stay or Should I Go?” while his hindbrain blasted “Go Now.”

Something definitely rotten in New Orleans. A guy with a contract out on him didn’t stand at a window. He’d have all the curtains drawn and all the doors barricaded. So Jack had pulled his pistol to see how he’d react. In the context having your name on a contract, “This is impossible!” was not a response that made any sense when looking down the muzzle of a gun.

But it made plenty of sense if the contract didn’t exist.

Chastain was lying – probably about many things. The smart thing to do was walk away. But Jack’s interest was piqued. What was the game here? He’d come a long way, the money was good, and he felt a need to see this through.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. The air was different here. Heavier than New York’s. Manhattan was old, and he’d found ancient secrets in its hidden corners. But this place… the atmosphere was laden with the rot of dark mysteries with maybe even a touch of magic hovering on the edges. Jack had seen magic. He hated magic.

…be prepared for deadly force…

Jack was hoping to avoid that, but he’d be ready.

Be prepared indeed… Face Off

April

Bloodline

(a wraparound cover variant by Harry Morris)

If we divide the mainline of the Repairman Jack saga into three acts, Bloodline kicks off Act III. Now we learn that one of the reasons Jack is the Heir lies in his genes.

Remember Jonah Stevens from Reborn? Well, he’s back… via his children. Hank Thompson and his Kickers burst on the scene. Hank plays a big part in Act III. Jack learns some unsettling things about himself.

But it all starts innocently enough. Here in an early scene Jack returns a call from Christie, a prospective customer, who’s worried about her daughter Dawn. He’s looking for a way to turn her down, but it’s a vulnerable time in his life, and he agrees to meet with her. Big mistake…

BLOODLINE

(sample)

Jack stepped into his apartment and sniffed. The air carried a musty tang. Not all that unusual after being closed up for a while. The old wood and old varnish on his Victorian wavy oak furniture gave off subtle but pleasant odors. The must came from the other junk arrayed on the walls – treasure in his eyes, but he had no illusions that most other people would consider it junk. Or maybe junque.

He jammed his finger into the soil in the pink Shmoo planter as he passed. Nothing stuck. The little ivy plant was thirsty. Had to remember to add water before he left. He glanced at the framed official membership certificates in The Shadow and Doc Savage fan clubs and straightened the Don Winslow Creed on his way to the oak secretary.

Once there, he angled it out from the wall and removed its rear panel. An array of pistols adorned the top, side, and rear walls of the hidden space within. A rolled-up ten-by-twelve-inch flap of skin lay to the left, next to the Compendium of Srem. A Ruger SuperRedhawk chambered for .454 Casulls rested atop that.

Jack slipped the book free. Big and heavy, its covers and spine made of some sort of stamped metal.

With the secretary closed and returned to its original position, he placed the Compendium on the paw-foot oak table but did not open it. Something about the way the characters blurred and swam for an instant whenever he peeked inside made him queasy.

Instead he pulled his Tracfone from a pocket along with a slip of paper. He dialed the number Christy P had left. She picked up on the third ring.

“Yes?”

“Christy? This is Jack. You left this number on my website.”

A pause, then, “Oh, yes. Repairman Jack.” Her tone was hesitant. “Interesting name. Did your mother pick it?”

“No, and neither did I. But it gets the job done. You mentioned something about your daughter and a mistake?”

“I think I’m having second thoughts about hiring someone for this via the Internet.”

Smart lady.

“Consider having third and fourth thoughts while you’re at it. But my site isn’t the sort people find by accident. Someone must have sent you. Who?”

“Jeff Levinson. You know the name?”

“I do.”

Jack had hired on a few years ago to take care of a recurrent swastika problem at Jeff’s delicatessen.

“He speaks very highly of you. But still…”

“Your call, lady.”

“I don’t know…”

He could almost hear her chewing her lip.

“Maybe I can help you make up your mind if you tell me what you need done.”

“How’s that going to work?”

“Because maybe I’m not interested.”

A brief pause. “Interesting tactic, playing hard to get.”

“Not a tactic. I am hard to get.”

Especially these days.

“I like that. I suppose we should meet then. I want someplace public because–"

“You haven’t told me yet what you need done.”

“So you’re really serious about that.”

“Some fixes I can do, some I can’t. No sense in both of us wasting our time.”

Even this phone call was beginning to sound like a waste of time.

She sighed. “Okay. She’s involved with an older man.”

Hoo boy. Jack glanced at his watch. How much time had he just wasted?

“So?”

“He’s old enough to be her father.”

“So?”

“Can you say something else?”

“I’m waiting to hear something I can do something about. Affairs of the heart do not fall into that category.”

“Dawn’s eighteen and he’s in his mid thirties. Twice her age.”

Jack’s age.

He tried to imagine a relationship with an eighteen-year old. What the hell would they talk about? What could he have in common with someone who hadn’t finished her second decade, who was basically a high school kid? Sure, fantasy cheerleader sex and all that, but you needed something more to fill the down time.

Or did you?

He guessed coming so close to being a father – of a daughter, no less – could be affecting his perspective.

“I don’t see how hiring me is going to help, Christy. What are you looking for? Someone to break his legs? Shoot him? That’s not the way I work.”

At least not unless someone really had it coming.

“No, nothing like that! I want to get something on him. Something that’ll let my little girl see him for what he really is.”

“You already know what he really is?”

“Well…no. But there’s got to be something. There’s always something, right? Besides, I get a bad vibe from this guy.”

Time to end this.

“I suppose. But what you need is a private investigator. Someone who can–"

“I’ve already been that route.”

“And?”

“Long story. Look, Jeff said you were tops – pricey, but tops – and just the guy I need. Can’t we just sit down and talk over the details? I probably shouldn’t say this, but money isn’t an object. I’ve got money. It’s results I want.”

“I don’t think I’m your man.”

“If nothing else, maybe you can get my retainer back from the investigator I hired.” Out of the blue she sobbed. Once. The sound took Jack by surprise. He hadn’t seen it coming. “Please? I’m really, really worried about my little girl.”

Her little girl…she might be eighteen, but he guessed your little girl was your little girl forever.

Like Emma would have been.

“Okay. We’ll meet. I’ll listen. But I’m not promising anything.”

A sniff. “Thank you. Where? No offense, but I’ll feel safer if it’s a public place.”

Jack laughed. “So will I. Where are you located?”

“Queens. Forest Hills.”

Fairly ritzy neighborhood.

“That means it’s no big deal to get into the city.”

“I’m in all the time.”

He doubted he could help her, but he could hear her out and maybe point her in the right direction.

“Can you make it in this afternoon?”

He was testing. If she wouldn’t meet this afternoon, he’d know it wasn’t as important as she’d made it seem.

“Sure. Tell me when and where.”

Well, that settled that.

“There’s this bar I know in the West Eighties…”

Jack’s gonna regret this… Bloodline

May

By the Sword

(early scrapped cover for the

trade edition – that’s not a katana)

Remember Naka, Frank and Meiko’s son from Black Wind? Nagata’s katana, the famous Gaijin Masamune, has been stolen and he wants it back. The Kakureta Kao cult is back too, looking for the sword and a way to bring back the Kuroikaze – the Black Wind. And Hank Thomson and his Kickers want it too.

All these disparate groups after the same thing. How do I resolve this in Jack’s favor? I asked myself, WWQTD? (What would Quentin Tarrantino do?) Of course: a bloodbath.

But first, you bring Glaeken on the scene. (NB: This was Jack’s opening scene in the original Nightworld, but since I needed to put J and G together before that, I moved it here.) Jack doesn’t realize that this is the second time he’s meeting this old dude.

By the Sword

(sample)

1

They weren't making muggers like they used to.

After trolling for about an hour through the unseasonably warm May night, here was the second he'd found – or rather had found him. Jack was wearing a Hard Rock Cafe sweatshirt, acid-washed jeans, and his I ♥ New York visor. The compleat tourist. A piece of raw steak dangling before a hungry wolf.

When he'd spotted the guy tailing him, he'd wandered off the pavement and down into this leafy glade. Off to his right the mercury-vapor glow from Central Park West backlit the trees. Over his assailant’s shoulder he could make out the year-round Christmas lights on the trees that flanked the Tavern-on-the-Green.

Jack studied the guy facing him. A hulking figure in the shadows, maybe twenty-five, about six-foot, pushing two-hundred pounds, giving him an inch and thirty pounds on Jack. He had stringy brown hair bleached blond on top, all combed to the side so it hung over his right eye; the left side of his head above the ear and below the part had been buzzcut down to the scalp – the Flock of Seagulls guy after a run-in with a lawn mower. Pale, pimply skin and a skull dangling on a chain from his left ear. Black boots, baggy black pants, black Polio T-shirt, fingerless black leather gloves, one of which was wrapped around the handle of a big Special Forces knife, the point angled toward Jack's belly.

"You talking to me, Rambo?" Jack said.

"Yeah." The guy's voice was nasal. He twitched and sniffed, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. "I'm talkin a you. See anybody else here?"

Jack glanced around. "No. I guess if there were, you wouldn't have stopped me."

"Gimme your wallet."

Jack looked him in the eye. This was the part he liked.

"No."

The guy jerked back as if he'd been slapped, then stared at Jack, obviously unsure of how to take that.

"What you say?"

"I said no. En-oh. What's the matter? You never heard that word before?"

Probably hadn't.

His voice rose. "You crazy? Gimme your wallet or I cut you. You wanna get cut?"

"No. Don't want to get cut."

“Give it or I stab you in the uterus.”

What?

Fighting a laugh, Jack said, “Wouldn‘t want that.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a wad of cash. "I left my wallet home. Will this do?"

The guy's eyes all but bulged. His free hand darted out.

"Give it!"

Jack shoved it back into his pocket.

"Nope."

"You crazy fucker–!"

As he lunged at Jack, jabbing the bladepoint at his belly, Jack spun away, giving him plenty of room to miss. Not that he was worried about any surprises. Most of his type had wasted muscles and sluggish reflexes. But you had to respect that saw-toothed blade. A mean sucker.

The guy made a clumsy turn and came back, slashing face high this time. Jack ducked, grabbed the wrist behind the knife as it went by, got a two-handed grip, and twisted.

Hard.

The guy shouted with pain as he was jerked into an armlock with his weapon flattened between his shoulder blades. He kicked backward, landing a boot heel on one of Jack's shins. Wincing with pain, Jack gritted his teeth and kicked the mugger's feet out from under him. As the guy went down on his face, he yanked the imprisoned arm back straight and rammed his right sneaker behind the shoulder, pinning him.

And then he stopped and counted to ten.

At times like these he knew he was in danger of losing it. The blackness hovered there on the edges, beckoning him, urging him to go Mongol on this guy, to take out all his accumulated anger, frustration, rage on this one pathetic jerk.

Plenty accumulated during his day-to-day life. And every day it seemed to get a little worse.

He knew now the origin of that blackness, where it hid in his cells. But that didn’t make it go away or any easier to handle. So when one of these knuckle draggers got within reach, like this doughy lump of dung, he wanted to stomp him into the earth, leaving nothing but a wet stain.

A thin wire here, one he Wallenda’d along, trying not to fall off on the wrong side. Spend too much time on the wrong side and you became like this jerk.

He did a ten count and willed that blackness back down to wherever it lived. Let out his breath and looked down.

"Hey, man,” Polio fan whined. “Can't you take a joke? I was only–"

"Drop the knife."

"Sure, sure."

The bare fingers opened, the big blade’s handle slipped from the gloved palm and clattered to the earth.

"Okay? I dropped it, okay? Now lemme up."

Jack released the arm but kept a foot on his back.

"Empty your pockets."

"Hey, what–?"

Jack increased the pressure of his foot. "Empty them.”

"Okay! Okay!"

He reached back and pulled a ragged cloth wallet from his hip pocket, then slid it across the dirt.

"Keep going," Jack said. "Everything."

The guy pulled a couple of crumpled wads of bills from his front pockets, and dumped them by the wallet.

"You a cop?"

"You should be so lucky."

Jack squatted beside him and went through the small pile. About a hundred in cash, half a dozen credit cards, a gold high school ring. The wallet held a couple of twenties, three singles, and no ID.

"I see you've been busy tonight."

"Early bird catches the worm."

"Yeah? Consider yourself a nightcrawler. This all you got?"

"Aw, you ain't gonna jack me, are ya?”

“Interesting choice of words.”

“Hey, I need that scratch."

"Your jones needs that scratch."

Actually, the Little League needed that scratch.

Every year about this time the kids from the local teams that played here in the Park would come knocking, looking for donations toward uniforms and equipment. Jack had made it a tradition to help them out by taking up nocturnal collections in the Park.

The Annual Repairman Jack Park-a-thon.

Seemed only fair that the oxygen wasters who prowled the place at night should make donations to the kids who used it during the day. At least Jack thought so.

"Let me see those hands." He'd noticed an increasingly lower class of mugger over the past few years. Like this guy. Nothing on his fingers but a cheap pewter skull-faced pinky ring with red glass eyes. "How come no gold?" Jack pulled down the back of his collar. "No chains? You're pathetic, you know that? Where's your sense of style?"

The previous donor had been better heeled.

"I'm a working man," the guy said, rolling a little and looking up at Jack. "No frills."

"Yeah. What do you work at?"

"This!"

The guy lunged for his knife, grabbed the handle, and stabbed up at Jack's groin – maybe thinking he’d find a uterus there? Jack rolled away to his left and kicked him in the face as he lunged again. The guy went down and Jack was on him once more with the knife arm yanked high and his sneaker back in its former spot on his back.

"We've already played this scene once," he said through his teeth as the blackness rose again.

"Hey, listen!" the guy said into the dirt. "You can have the dough!"

"No kidding."

Jack yanked off the glove and looked at the hand within. No surprise at the tattoo in the thumb web.

These guys were starting to pollute the city.

“So you’re a Kicker, eh.”

“Yeah, man. Totally dissimilated. You too? You seem like–"

He screamed as Jack shifted his foot into the rear of his shoulder and kicked down while giving the arm a sharp twist. The shoulder dislocated with a muffled pop, nearly drowned out by the high-pitched wail.

He hadn’t wanted him to finish that sentence.

The Rambo knife dropped from suddenly limp fingers. Jack kicked it away and released the arm.

“Don’t know about the rest of you, but that arm is definitely dissimilated.”

As the guy retched and writhed in the dirt, Jack scooped up the cash and rings. He emptied the wallet and dropped it onto the guy's back, then headed for the lights.

He debated whether to troll for a third donor or call it a night. He mentally calculated that he had donations of about three hundred or so in cash and maybe an equal amount in pawnable gold. He'd set the goal of this year's Park-a-thon at twelve hundred dollars. Didn’t look like he was going to make that without some extra effort. Which meant he'd have to come back tomorrow night and bag a couple more.

And exhort them to give.

Give till it hurt.

2

As he was coming up the slope toward Central Park West he saw an elderly, bearded gent dressed in an expensive-looking blue blazer and gray slacks trudging with a cane along the Park side of the street.

And about a dozen feet to Jack's left, a skinny guy in dirty Levi's and a frayed Hawaiian shirt burst from the bushes at a dead run. At first Jack thought he was running from someone, but noticed that he never glanced behind him. Which meant he was running toward something. He realized the guy was making a beeline for the old man.

Jack paused a second. The smart part of him said to turn and walk back down the slope. It hated when he got involved in things like this, and reminded him of other times he'd played good Samaritan and landed in hot water. Besides, the area here was too open, too exposed. If Jack got involved he could be mistaken for the Hawaiian shirt's partner, a description would start circulating, and life would get more complicated than it already was.

Butt out.

Sure. Sit back while this galloping glob of Park scum bowled the old guy over, kicked him a few times, grabbed his wallet, then high-tailed it back into the brush. Jack wasn't sure he could stand by and let something like that happen right in front of him.

A wise man he’d hung with during his early years in the city had advised him time and time again to walk away from a fight whenever possible. Then he’d always add: “But there are certain things I will not abide in my sight.”

This looked to be something Jack could not abide in his sight.

Besides, he was feeling kind of mean tonight.

He spurted into a dash of his own toward the old gent. No way he was going to beat the aloha guy with the lead he had, but he could get there right after him and maybe disable him before he did any real damage. Nothing elaborate. Hit him in the back with both feet, break a few ribs and give his spine a whiplash he'd remember the rest of his life. Make sure Aloha was down to stay, then keep right on sprinting across Central Park West into yuppyville.

Aloha was closing with his target, arms stretched out for the big shove, when the old guy stepped aside and stuck out his cane. Aloha went down on his belly and skidded face first along the sidewalk, screaming curses all the way. When he stopped his slide, he began to roll to his feet.

But the old guy was there, holding the bottom end of his cane in a two-handed grip like a golf club. He didn't yell "Fore!" as he swung the metal handle around in a smooth, wide arc. Jack heard the crack when it landed against the side of Aloha's skull. The mugger stiffened, then flopped back like a sack of flour.

Jack stopped dead and stared, then began to laugh. He pumped a fist in the old guy's direction.

"Nice!"

“I needed that,” the old dude said.

Jack knew exactly how he felt. Still smiling, he broke into an easy jog, intending to give the old dude a wide berth on his way by. The fellow eyed him as he neared.

"No worry," Jack said, raising his empty palms, "I'm on your side."

The old guy had his cane by the handle again; he nonchalantly stepped over Aloha like he was so much refuse. The guy had style.

"I know that, Jack."

Jack nearly tripped as he stuttered to a halt and turned.

"Why'd you call me Jack?"

The old man came abreast of him and stopped. Gray hair and beard, a wrinkled face, pale eyes.

"Because that’s your name."

Jack scrutinized the man. Even though slightly stooped, he was still taller than Jack. Big guy. Old, but big. And a complete stranger. Jack didn't like being recognized. Put him on edge. But he found something appealing about that half smile playing about the old dude's lips.

"Do I know you?"

"No. My name's Veilleur, by the way." He offered his hand. "And I've wanted to meet you again for some time now.”

“Again? When did we ever meet?”

“In your youth.”

“But I don’t–"

“It’s not important. I’m sure it will come back to you. What’s important is now and getting reacquainted. I came out here tonight for just that purpose."

Jack shook his hand, baffled. "But who–?" And then a sixty-watter lit in his head. “You don’t happen to own a Homburg, do you?”

His smile broadened. “As a matter of fact I do. But it’s such a beautiful night I left it home.”

For months now Jack had intermittently spotted a bearded old man in a Homburg standing outside his apartment or Gia’s place. But no matter what he’d tried he’d never been able to catch or even get near the guy.

And now here he was, chatting away as casually as could be.

Jack stared at him. “Why have you been watching me?”

“Trying to decide the right time to connect with you. Because it is time we joined forces. Past time, I’d say.”

“Why didn’t you just knock on my door? Why all the cat-and-mouse stuff?”

“I doubt very much you like people knowing the location of your door, let alone knocking on it.”

Jack had to admit he had that right.

“And besides,” Veilleur added, “you had more than enough on your plate at the time.”

Jack sighed as the events of the past few months swirled around him. “True that. But–?”

"Let's walk, shall we?"

They crossed Central Park West and headed toward Columbus Avenue in silence. Though they’d just met, Jack found something about the old guy that he couldn't help liking and trusting. On a very deep, very basic, very primitive level he didn't understand, he sensed a solidarity with Veilleur, a subliminal bond, as if they were kindred spirits.

But when and where had they met before?

"Want to tell me what's going on?"

Veilleur didn’t hesitate. "The end of life as we know it."

Somehow, Jack wasn’t surprised. He’d heard this before. He felt an enormous weight descend on him.

“It’s coming, isn’t it.”

He nodded. “Relentlessly moving our way. But the key fact to remember is it hasn’t arrived yet. Relentlessness does not confer inevitability. Look at your run-in with the rakoshi. What’s more relentless than a rakosh? Yet you defeated a shipload of them.”

Jack stopped and grabbed Veilleur's arm.

"Wait a sec. Wait a sec. What do you know about rakoshi? And how do you know?"

"I'm sensitive to certain things. I sensed their arrival. But I was more acutely aware of the necklaces worn by Kusum Bahkti and his sister."

Jack felt slightly numb. The only other people who knew about the rakoshi and the necklaces were the two most important people in his world – Gia and Vicky – plus two others: Abe and…

"Did Kolabati send you?"

"No. I wish I knew where she was. We may have need of her before long, but we have other concerns right now.”

“‘We’?”

“Yes. We.”

Jack stared at Veilleur. “You’re him, aren’t you. You’re the one Herta told me about. You’re Glae–"

The old man raised a hand. “I am Veilleur – Glenn Veilleur. That is the only name I answer to now. It is best it remains that way lest the other name is overheard.”

“Gotcha,” Jack said, though he didn’t.

So this was Glaeken, the Ally’s point man on Earth – or former point man, rather. Jack had thought he’d be more impressive – taller, younger.

“We must speak of other things, Jack. Many things.”

There was an understatement. But where?

Of course.

"You like beer?"

This way to the bloodbath… By the Sword

July

Ground Zero

At this time – the late aughts – in addition to writing the main-line Jack novels, I was writing the Teen Trilogy as well… and falling in love with Weezy. I couldn’t let her go, so I brought her back into Jack’s life. And since she’s an expert on the Secret History and the conspiracies that fuel it, she finds that what we think we know about the Trade Tower attacks may not be all here is to know.

If you’ve been reading in order, you will learn why Trejador and Drexler were so upset in 1993 when they heard of the first plot to bring down the towers. The Secret History has slowly begun dominating the novels now.

Ground Zero

(sample)

Surreal, he thought as he watched the twin Towers burn.

His rented boat rocked gently on the waters of New York harbor, a thousand feet off the Battery. The morning sun blazed in a flawless cerulean sky. But for the susurrus of the light breeze and the soft lapping of the waves against the hull, the world lay silent about him.

A beautiful, beautiful day…

…unless you were anywhere near those towers.

He tried to imagine the Pandemonium in the streets around them – the klaxons, the sirens, the shouts, the confusion, the terror. Not a hint of that here. The Towers belched black smoke like a couple of chimneys, but all in silence.

He checked his watch: nearly ten o’clock. The plan was to allow an hour or so of chaos after the Arabs completed their mission. By then, though fear and terror would still be running high, the initial panic would have subsided. The situation would be considered horrific and tragic, but manageable. The second jet had hit at 9:03, so the hour mark was almost upon him. Time to initiate the second phase – the real reason for all this.

From a pocket of his windbreaker he pulled a pair of gray plastic boxes, each the size of a cigarette pack – one marked with an S for the South Tower, the other with an N for the north. He put the N away for later. After all, the South Tower was the important one, the reason for this enormous undertaking.

He extended an aerial from the S box, then slid up a little safety cover on its front panel, revealing a black button. He took a breath and pressed the button, then watched and waited.

The vast majority would blame the collapse on the crazy Arabs who hijacked the planes and the Islamic extremists who funded them – the obvious choice. A few would notice inconsistencies and point fingers elsewhere, blaming the government or Big Oil or some other powerful but faceless entity.

No one, absolutely no one, would guess – or be allowed to guess – the truth behind the who and the why of this day.

Hmmm…who’s the guy in the boat? (hint: he’s someone you’ve known for a long time)

Find out here… Ground Zero

…ends in August

THE TOUCH

Weird Walt has had the Dat-Tay-Vao too long. It’s killing him. Time to pass it on. It came to America for a reason. It knows it will be needed here. It’s been waiting, and now its time is nearing.

Poor Dr. Alan Bulmer. He has no idea of the trouble that lies ahead…

THE TOUCH

(sample)

Alan was all set to spend a nice, quiet evening at home when the answering service patched through a call from Joe Barton, a longtime patient. He was coughing up blood. Alan told him to get right over to the emergency room and he'd meet him there.

Joe turned out to have a heavily consolidated lobar pneumonia. But because he was a smoker and there was the chance that something sinister might be lurking in the infiltrated area of lung, he scheduled him for a CT scan tomorrow.

As he approached the ER nursing desk, a voice called out from the corner gurney.

"You! Hey, you! You're the one!"

The overhead light in the corner was out. Alan squinted into the dimness. A disheveled old man in shapeless clothes lay there, gesturing to him. Alan didn't recognize him, but threw him a friendly wave in passing.

"Who's in the corner cot?" he said to McClain when he reached the desk. "Anybody I know?"

"For your sake, I hope not," she said. "He's drunk as a skunk and doesn't smell much better. Doesn't even know his name."

“What's wrong with him?"

"Says he came here to die."

"That's encouraging."

McLain snorted. "Not on my shift, it ain't. Anyway, we've got lab and a chest X-ray cooking, and EKG is on the way."

"Who's on service?"

"Your old buddy, Alberts."

McClain was one of the few nurses still around who would remember that Alan and Lou Alberts had been partners – how many years ago? Could it be seven years already since they'd split?

"I'm sure they'll get along fine together," he said with an evil grin.

McClain barked a laugh. "I'm sure!"

On his way back to say good night to Joe, the man in the corner cot called to him again.

"Hey, you! C'mere! S'time!"

Alan waved but kept walking. The man was in no distress, just drunk.

"Hey! S'time! C'mere. Please!"

The note of desperation in that last word made Alan stop and turn toward the corner. The man was motioning him over.

"C'mere."

Alan walked to the side of the gurney, then backed up a step. It was the same bum who had banged on his car Tuesday night. And McClain hadn't been kidding. He was filthy and absolutely foul smelling. Yet even the stench from his pavement-colored clothes and shoeless feet couldn't quite cover the reek of cheap wine on the breath wheezing from his toothless mouth.

"What can I do for you?" Alan said.

"Take my hand." He held out a filthy paw with cracked skin and blackened, ragged fingernails.

"Gee, I don't know," Alan said, trying to keep the mood light. "We haven't even been introduced."

"Please take it."

Alan took a breath. Why hadn't he just walked on by like everybody else?

He shrugged and reached out his right hand. The poor guy did look like he was dying, and this seemed important to him. Besides, he'd had his hands in worse places.

As soon as his fingers neared the derelict's, the filthy hand leaped up and grabbed him in an iron grip. Pain blossomed in his fingers and palm, but from more than pressure. Light blazed around him as a jolt like high-voltage electricity coursed up his arm, convulsing his muscles, causing him to thrash uncontrollably like a fish on a hook. Dark spots flared in his vision, coalescing, blotting out the derelict, the emergency room, everything.

And then the grip was broken and he was reeling backward, off balance, his hands reaching for something, anything to keep him from falling. He felt fabric against his left hand, grabbed it, realizing it was a privacy curtain as he heard its fasteners snap free of the ceiling track under his weight. But at least it slowed his fall, lessening the blow to the back of his head as it struck the nearby utility table. His vision blurred, then cleared to reveal McClain's shocked expression as she leaned over him.

"What happened? You okay?"

Alan rubbed his right hand with his left. The electric shock sensation was gone, but the flesh still tingled all the way down to the bone.

"I think so. What the hell did he do to me?"

McClain glanced at the corner gurney. "Him?" She straightened up and gave the derelict a closer look. "Oh, shit!" She darted out toward the desk and came back pushing the crash cart.

From the overhead speaker the operator's voice blared, "Code Blue – ER! Code Blue – ER!"

Nurses and orderlies appeared from every direction. Dr. Lo, the ER physician for the night, ran in from the doctors' lounge and took charge of the resuscitation, giving Alan a puzzled look as he darted by.

Alan tried to stand, intending to help with the CPR, but found his knees wobbly and his right arm numb. By the time he felt steady enough the help, Lo had called the resuscitation to a halt. Despite all their efforts, the heart had refused to start up again. The monitor showed only a wavering line when McClain finally turned it off.

"Great!" she said. "Just great! Don't even know his name! A coroner's case for sure! I'll be filling out forms for days!"

Lo came over to Alan, a half smile on his Asian face.

"For a second there, when I saw you on the floor, I thought we'd be working on you. What happened? He hit you?"

Alan didn't know how to explain what had happened, so he just nodded. "Yeah. Must have been some sort of Stokes-Adams attack or something as he arrested."

Alan went over to the corner cot, stepped inside the drawn curtains, and pulled down the covering sheet. The old man's head was half turned toward Alan, his mouth slack, his eyes half open and glazed. Alan gently pushed the lids closed.

He cradled his right arm in his left. It still felt strange.

What the hell did you do to me?

He could think of no explanation for the shock that had run up his arm. It had come from the derelict, of that he was sure. But where had he got it? Alan had no answer, and the dead man wasn't going to tell him, so he pulled the sheet back over the face and walked away.

Alan will now be able to heal with a touch. But nothing comes without a price…

Learn the cost here… The Touch

…ends in September

The Peabody-Ozymandias Traveling

Circus & Oddity Emporium

These characters – all touched by the Otherness – started out in Freak Show, an anthology I edited for HWA back in 1990 or so. I wasn’t content to do a simple anthology. I had to interconnect all the contributions and write a wraparound story and bits of interstitial material. Was I crazy? Damn right. Never do that again.

It sold, went out of print, and that was that. Except I hated seeing all that work go to waste. And since I held the copyright to my material, no reason it should lie fallow.

I added about 10k words of new material and let a small press do a limited edition. Well, the 500 copies sold out on publication and the price was tripling on the aftermarket. Lots of people who couldn’t afford the limited wanted to read it, so I self-published a trade paperback and an ebook.

The Device is another of the Seven Infernals. Oz appears in All the Rage and his father appears with the Device in Jack: Secret Circles. But Oz first appeared here…

The Peabody-Ozymandias Traveling

Circus & Oddity Emporium

(sample)

"It will be a long trip, brothers and sisters," he said as he walked among the members of his troupe. "Long in distance and in days."

Half an hour ago Oz had watched them straggle in and seat themselves in a rough circle. He’d hurried through the mundane details of the coming tour, and now he segued into the important part, the crucial part, the part they would have difficulty grasping and believing.

"And perhaps it is good that we make a full circuit of this country – better yet if we could make a circuit of the globe – for it will allow us a chance to see it and remember it as it was – if we care to."

He let his gaze range over them as he allowed the words to sink in.

All the important ones were here. The special ones, the ones like him. Three-eyed Carmella sat with melon-headed Leshane Burns, flashing sidelong glances at George Swenson who sat alone; the bovine Clementine also sat alone, but not necessarily by choice; woody-skinned Bramble sat near green-skinned Haman who appeared to be staring at the closed tent flap while the eyeless Gerald Gaines stared at nothing yet saw everything; Delta Reid coiled around her chair as Janusch waved his stalked eyes about. Others sat scattered about. The troupe had no unity yet. They were not yet a team. But they would be by the end of this tour. They’d be family.

Tarantello hovered at the rear while the Beagle Boys manned the flaps – this was a private meeting.

The troupe. The freak show. People with green skin, white skin, furry skin, reptile hide, no eyes, extra eyes, no digits, extra digits, people with visions, with no vision, with one face, with two faces. A gathering to give many a townie nightmares for life. But to Oz they were beautiful. Because they were kin. Brother and sister were not forms of address he took lightly. Truly kin. For they shared a common parent, a third parent that had left an indelible imprint on their genes.

The Otherness. Each had been touched by the Otherness.

George Swenson looked up at him from under a furrowed brow and posed the question Oz had known someone would ask.

"Remember it 'as it was'?" he said. "I don't get it."

"I shall explain," Oz said. "But first I must tell you that I did not arrange this tour merely to make more money. We will do that, but the money is unimportant." He watched the brothers and sisters nudge each other and mutter. He'd expected that. "What is important is the search. For while we are touring we will be searching for a series of objects."

"Like a scavenger hunt?" Janusch said, his eyes standing tall.

"In a way, yes. But in this hunt there will be no single winner. If we are successful, all of us will be winners."

"What will we win?" George said.

"Justice. Understanding. Acceptance. Compensation."

The expressions facing him – the readable ones – were frankly dubious.

"I don't get it," said Carmella, blinking her third eye.

"And you never have," Oz said. "Justice, that is. None of you has. You've been shunned at best, and at worst you've been reviled, abandoned, beaten, and tortured. But never… never understood. With your cooperation, this tour will change all that."

"Will it give me hands?" said George Swenson.

"No," Oz said. "You won't need them."

"Will it give me arms?" said Earl Cassell.

"No. You won't need them."

"Will it straighten my spine?" said Ginny Metcalf.

"No. You won't need a straight spine."

"Will it let my branchlets live for more than a few minutes?” said Bramble.

Oz smiled and nodded. "Most definitely yes."

"Will it get me a keg of German beer?" said Leshane.

Everyone laughed.

"I still don't get it," said Delta.

"A change," Oz said. "We have an opportunity to work a change upon the land. And the instrument of that change cannot be activated until we find all its components and reassemble them."

"A machine?" George said. "A machine is going to change the world?"

Oz nodded. He'd known this was going to be a tough sell. He barely believed it himself. But he had to have their cooperation. He could not succeed without it.

"Yes. When the Device is activated at the proper time in the proper place, it will, quite literally, change the world – change the way the world sees us, change the way the world sees itself."

He paused and let them mutter among themselves, then raised his voice.

"You need not believe me. I realize that might be too much to ask. But I do ask that you trust me. As we make a circuit of the country I will from time to time ask one of you to venture into the town we are passing through and retrieve one of the missing pieces of the Device. You do not have to believe that it will change our place in the world; all you need know is that it is important to me and to those of your brothers and sisters who do believe."

Oz turned in a slow circle, eyeing each in turn.

"Have I ever lied to you?"

He noted with satisfaction that every head was wagging back and forth.

"No. I do not lie." He pointed to the outer world beyond the tent wall. "They lie to you. I do not. And I say to you now that the Device is monumentally important to all our lives. Is there any one of you who will not help collect its component parts as we travel?"

Oz searched the members of his troupe for a raised hand. He saw none.

"Excellent. And to give you some idea of the nature of the Pieces you'll be seeking, I've brought along a few to show you."

Oz withdrew the four objects that had been waiting in the pockets of his coat and handed them to the nearest members of the troupe.

"Here. Pass these around. Don't worry about damaging them – you can't. Just don't lose them."

***

George felt something like a cold shock when the first Piece reached him. The sensation ran through his boneless forearm up to the left side of his face; from there it seemed to penetrate his skull and shoot across his brain. Vertigo spun him and for an instant he thought he saw another place full of weird angles superimposed on the tent space – coexisting with the tent space – then he steadied again.

He looked down at the thing in his hand, blinked, then looked again. Dull yellow metal, but such a strange shape. A couple of the sides met at an angle that didn't seem possible – shouldn't have been possible.

He passed it on and reached for another.

This one looked hard and glossy but felt soft and fuzzy, almost alive; he thought he sensed it breathing.

He quickly dumped that one off and reached for the next – a flat ceramic oval.

But he sensed something wrong with this one too. He couldn't pinpoint it at first, then he noticed it didn't cast a shadow; it was solid, opaque, but no matter which way he turned it… no shadow.

The last object was a tennis ball size sphere and it did cast a shadow – but one with sharp angles.

George cradled this last Piece in his coiled left arm and stared at Oz where he stood in the center of the tent. One strange dude. Aloof and yet paternalistic; even the freaks who'd been with him for years knew little about him. He’d heard more than one mention that no one had ever seen him eat. Full trays were delivered to his trailer and removed empty, but he always ate alone. His only close contact seemed to be Tarantello, another one who never seemed to eat – never even got trays. The freaks kidded about taking "a walk with Tarantello." George didn't know what that meant but decided from the timbre of their voices that he'd rather not find out.

And now these Pieces. Strange little things to say the least. Almost…otherworldly.

One could only imagine the sort of Device their aggregate would produce. An instrument like that might be capable of almost anything.

Even Justice…

…Understanding…

…Acceptance…

…Compensation.

Hop aboard here… The Peabody-Ozymandias Traveling Circus & Oddity Emporium

Tenants

The idea for "Tenants" had been wandering through the back of my mind for years. A simple little story about an escaped killer who thinks he's found the perfect hideout from the law in a remote house at the end of a road through a salt marsh. The old coot who lives there is crazy: He keeps talking about his tenants, but he's alone in the shack. Or is he?

I could have set it anywhere, but I chose Monroe because I was simultaneously working on Reborn, which is set in Monroe. Why were all these strange things happening in Monroe? Why had the Dat tay vao been drawn to Monroe in The Touch? Was it all random, or was there a reason? I realized Reborn contained that reason. So if the old guy in "Tenants" has some strange boarders, maybe they too wound up in Monroe for a reason. The locale had no direct effect on the novelette itself, but it gave me a little extra kick to know I was connecting it to the cycle.

George has a cameo in All the Rage, and he and his tenants play a crucial role in the Secret History, as you’ll see in Nightworld.

Tenants

(sample)

The mail truck was coming.

Gilroy Connors, shoes full of water and shirt still wet from the morning's heavy dew, crouched in the tall grass and punk-topped reeds. He ached all over; his thighs particularly were cramped from holding his present position. But he didn't dare move for fear of giving his presence away.

So he stayed hunkered down across the road from the battered old shack that looked deserted but wasn't – there had been lights on in the place last night. With its single pitched roof and rotting cedar shake siding, it looked more like an overgrown outhouse that a home. A peeling propane tank squatted on the north side; a crumbling brick chimney supported a canted TV antenna. Beyond the shack, glittering in the morning sunlight, lay the northeast end of Monroe Harbor and the Long Island Sound. The place gave new meaning to the word isolated. As if a few lifetimes ago someone had brought a couple of tandems of fill out to the end of the hard-packed dirt road, dumped them, and built a shack. Except for a rickety old dock with a sodden rowboat tethered to it, there was not another structure in sight in either direction. Only a slender umbilical cord of insulated wire connected it to the rest of the world via a long column of utility poles marching out from town. All around was empty marsh.

Yeah. Isolated as all hell.

It was perfect.

As Gil watched, the shack's front door opened and a grizzled old man stumbled out, a cigarette in his mouth and a fistful of envelopes in his hand. Tall and lanky with an unruly shock of gray hair standing off his head, he scratched his slightly protruding belly as he squinted in the morning sunlight. He wore a torn undershirt that had probably been white once and a pair of faded green work pants held up by suspenders, He looked as rundown as his home, and as much in need of a shave and a bath as Gil felt. With timing so perfect that it could only be the result of daily practice, the old guy reached the mailbox at exactly the same time as the white jeep-like mail truck.

Must have been watching from the window.

Not an encouraging thought. Had the old guy seen Gil out here? If he had, he gave no sign. Which meant Gil was still safe.

He fingered the handle of the knife inside his shirt.

Lucky for him.

While the old guy and the mailman jawed, Gil studied the shack again. The place was a sign that his recent run of good luck hadn't deserted him yet. He had come out to the marshes to hide until things cooled down in and around Monroe and had been expecting to spend a few real uncomfortable nights out here. The shack would make things a lot easier.

Not much of a place. At most it looked big enough for two rooms and no more. Barely enough space for an ancient couple who didn't move around much – who ate, slept, crapped, watched TV and nothing more. Hopefully, it wasn't a couple. Just the old guy. That would make it simple. A wife, even a real sickly one, could complicate matters.

Gil wanted to know how many were living there before he invited himself in. Not that it would matter much. Either way, he was going in and staying for a while. He just liked to know what he was getting into before he made his move.

One thing was sure: He wasn't going to find any money in there. The old guy had to be next to destitute. But even ten bucks would have made him richer than Gil. He looked at the rusting blue late-sixties Ford Torino with the peeling vinyl roof and hoped it would run. But of course it ran. The old guy had to get into town to cash his Social Security check and buy groceries, didn't he?

Damn well better run.

It had been a long and sloppy trek into these marshes. He intended to drive out.

Finally the mail truck clinked into gear, did a U-turn, and headed back the way it had come. The old guy shoved a couple of envelopes into his back pocket, picked up a rake that had been leaning against the Ford, and began scratching at the dirt on the south side of the house.

Gil decided it was now or never. He straightened up and walked toward the shack. As his feet crunched on the gravel of the yard, the old man wheeled and stared at him with wide, startled eyes.

"Didn't mean to scare you," Gil said in his friendliest voice.

"Well, you sure as hell did, poppin' outta nowhere like that!" the old man said in a deep, gravelly voice. The cigarette between his lips bobbed up and down like a conductor's baton. "We don't exactly get much drop-in company out here. What happen? Boat run outta gas?"

Gil noticed the we with annoyance but played along. A stalled boat was as good an excuse as any for being out here in the middle of nowhere.

"Yeah. Had to paddle it into shore way back over there," he said, jerking a thumb over his shoulder.

"Well, I ain't got no phone for you to call anybody–”

No phone! It was all Gil could do to keep from cheering.

“–but I can drive you down to the marina and back so you can get some gas."

No hurry." He moved closer and leaned against the old Torino's fender. "You live out here all by yourself?"

The old man squinted at him, as if trying to recognize him. "I don't believe we've been introduced, son."

"Oh, right." Gil stuck out his hand. "Rick...Rick Summers."

"And I'm George Haskins," he said, giving Gil's hand a firm shake.

"What're you growing there?"

"Carrots. I hear fresh carrots are good for your eyes. Mine are so bad I try to eat as many as I can."

Half blind and no phone. This was sounding better every minute. Now, if he could just find out who the rest of the we was, he'd be golden.

He glanced around. Even though he was out in the middle of nowhere at the end of a dirt road that no one but the mailman and this old fart knew existed, he felt exposed. Naked, even. He wanted to get inside.

"Say, I sure could use a cup of coffee, Mr. Haskins. You think you might spare me some?"

George lets him in, much to his regret. But Gil regrets it more after he meets George’s tenants. Available in… The Barrens and Others

Pelts

Pa Jameson, in case you don’t see it, is the same Piney trapper from the Teen Trilogy. Some people never learn.

Possibly the only politically correct story I've ever written. I realized "Pelts" was based on a trendy idea, but I wrote it anyway. It springs from the same values that fueled the very incorrect "Buckets" (in Soft & Others).

"Where do you get your ideas?" It's a question we're all asked. I can tell you the instant this story began. It was the day I opened a copy of Rolling Stone and saw an ad placed by one of the animal rights groups. It featured an animal (a fox, I think) caught in a leg restraint trap. In a series of photos it showed a man approach the animal and crush its throat with his heel. The casual brutality of the act sickened and appalled me. I had to say something. And since I speak through my fiction, I began to write.

“Pelts” connects to the Secret History through those fabled Jersey Pine Barrens. It’s been reprinted often (including a Best of the Year anthology) and was adapted for Masters of Horror on Showtime, directed by Dario Argento. (My goriest story ever, and he made it gorier.)

It starts out on Old Man Foster’s land in the Barrens. You remember Old Man Foster, don’t you?

Pelts

"I'm scared, Pa," Gary said.

"Shush!" Pa said, tossing the word over his shoulder as he walked ahead.

Gary shivered in the frozen predawn dimness and scanned the surrounding pines and brush for the thousandth time. He was heading for twenty years old and knew he shouldn't be getting the willies like this but he couldn't help it. He didn't like this place.

"What if we get caught?"

"Only way we'll get caught is if you keep yappin', boy," Pa said. "We're almost there. Wouldna brought you along cept I can't do all the carryin' myself! Now hesh up!"

Their feet crunched though the half-inch shroud of frozen snow that layered the sandy ground. Gary pressed his lips tightly together, kept an extra tight grip on the Louisville Slugger, and followed Pa through the brush. But he didn't like this one bit. Not that he didn't favor hunting and trapping. He liked them fine. Loved them, in fact. But he and Pa were on Zeb Foster's land today. And everybody knew that was bad news.

Old Foster owned thousands of acres in the Jersey Pine Barrens and didn't allow nobody to hunt them. Had "Posted" signs all around the perimeter. Always been that way with the Fosters. Pa said old Foster's granpa had started the no-trespassing foolishness and that the family was likely to hold to the damn stupid tradition till Judgment Day. Pa didn't think he should be fenced out of any part of the Barrens. Gary could go along with that most anywheres except old Foster's property.

There were stories...tales of the Jersey Devil roaming the woods here, of people poaching Foster's land and never being seen again. Those who disappeared weren't fools from Newark or Trenton who regularly got lost in the Pines and wandered in circles till they died. These were experienced trackers and hunters, Pineys just like Pa... and Gary.

Never seen again.

"Pa, what if we don't come out of here?" He hated the whiny sound in his voice and tried to change it. "What if somethin' gets us?"

"Ain't nothin gonna get us! Didn't I come in here yesterday and set the traps? And didn't I come out okay?"

"Yeah, but–"

"Yeah, but nothin'! The Fosters done a good job of spreadin' stories for generations to scare folk off. But they don't scare me. I know bullshit when I hear it."

"Is it much farther?"

"No. Right yonder over the next rise. A whole area crawlin' with coon tracks."

Gary noticed they were passing through a thick line of calf-high vegetation, dead now; looked as if it'd been dark and ferny before winterkill had turned it brittle. It ran off straight as a hunting arrow into the scrub pines on either side of them.

"Looky this, Pa. Look how straight this stuff runs. Almost like it was planted."

Pa snorted. "That wasn't planted. That's spleenwort – ebony spleenwort. Only place it grows around here is where somebody's used lime to set footings for a foundation. Soil's too acid for it otherwise. Find it growin' over all the vanished towns."

Gary knew there were lots of vanished towns in the Barrens, but this must have been one hell of a foundation. It was close to six feet wide and ran as far as he could see in either direction."

"What you think used to stand here, Pa?"

"Who knows, who cares? People was buildin' in the Barrens afore the Revolutionary War. And I hear tell there was crumblin' ruins already here when the Indians arrived. There's some real old stuff around these parts but we ain't about to dig it up. We're here for coon. Now hesh up till we get to the traps!"

*

Gary couldn't believe their luck. Every damn leg-hold trap had a coon in it! Big fat ones with thick, silky coats the likes of which he'd never seen. A few were already dead, but most of them were still alive, lying on their sides, their black eyes wide with fear and pain; panting, bloody, exhausted from trying to pull loose from the teeth of the traps, still tugging weakly at the chains that linked the trap to its stake.

He and Pa took care of the tuckered-out ones first by crushing their throats. Gary flipped them onto their backs and watched their stripped tails come up protectively over their bellies. I ain't after your belly, Mr. Coon. He put his heel right over the windpipe, and kicked down hard. If he was in the right spot he heard a satisfying crunch as the cartilage collapsed. The coons wheezed and thrashed and flopped around awhile in the traps trying to draw some air past the crushed spot but soon enough they choked to death. Gary had had some trouble doing the throat crush when he started at it years ago, but he was used to it by now. It was just the way it was done. All the trappers did it.

But you couldn't try that on the ones that still had some pepper in them. They wouldn't hold still enough for you to place your heel. That was where the Gary and his Slugger came in. He swung at one as it snapped at him.

"The head! The head, dammit!" Pa was yelling.

"Awright, awright!"

"Don't mess the pelts!"

Some of those coons were tough suckers. Took at least half a dozen whacks each with the Slugger to kill them dead. They'd twist and squeal and squirm around and it wasn't easy to pound a direct hit on the head every single time. But they weren't going nowhere, not with one of their legs caught in a steel trap.

By the time he and Pa reached the last trap, Gary's bat was drippy red up to the taped grip, and his bag was so heavy he could barely lift it. Pa's was just about full too.

"Damn!" Pa said, standing over the last trap. "Empty!" Then he knelt for a closer look. "No, wait! Looky that! It's been sprung! The paw's still in it! Musta chewed it off!"

Gary heard a rustle in the brush to his right and caught a glimpse of a gray-and-black striped tail slithering away.

"There it is!"

"Get it!"

Gary dropped the sack and went after the last coon. No sweat. It was missing one of its rear paws and left a trail of blood behind on the snow wherever it went. He came upon it within twenty feet. A fat one, waddling and gimping along as fast as its three legs would carry it. He swung but the coon partially dodged the blow and squalled as the bat glanced off its skull. The next shot got it solid but it rolled away. Gary kept after it through the brush, hitting it again and again, until his arms got tired. He counted nearly thirty strikes before he got in a good one. The big coon rolled over and looked at him with glazed eyes, blood running from its ears. He saw the nipples on its belly – a female. As he lifted the Slugger again, it raised its two front paws over its face – an almost human gesture that made him hesitate for a second. Then he clocked her with a winner. He bashed her head ten more times for good measure to make sure she wouldn't be going anywhere. The snow around her was splattered with red by the time he was done.

As he lifted her by her tail to take her back, he got a look at the mangled stump of her hind leg. Chewed off. God, you really had to want to get free to do something like that!

He carried her back to Pa, passing all the other splotches of crimson along the way. Looked like some bloody-footed giant had stomped through here.

"Whooeee!" Pa said when he saw the last one. "That's a beauty! They're all beauties! Gary, m'boy, we're gonna have money to burn when we sell these!"

Gary glanced at the sun as he tossed the last one into the sack. It was rising brightly into a clear sky.

"Maybe we shouldn't spend it until we get off Foster's land."

"You're right," Pa said, looking uneasy for the first time. "I'll come back tomorrow and rebait the traps." He slapped Gary on the back. "We found ourselfs a goldmine, son!"

Gary groaned under the weight of the sack, but he leaned forward and struck off toward the sun. He wanted to be gone from here. Quick like.

"I'll lead the way, Pa."

Available in… The Barrens and Others

…ends in February

Reprisal

Definitely my darkest novel. All about the seductiveness of evil. Jack’s story is now bumping into the Adversary Cycle.

I should say something about the infamous Danny scene in the flashback when Father Bill Ryan enters that cold dark house (Menalaus Manor, later bought by the Kenton brothers of The Haunted Air) on Christmas Eve and finds Danny. It almost didn't get written. I couldn't get the words out. I developed an aversion reaction to my keyboard. Every time I sat down I'd have to get up and walk around the room. I did not want to write that scene, did not want to hurt that little boy, and I especially didn't want to describe what had been done to him.

But I had to. Someone was trying to crush Father Ryan, utterly destroy him, but it takes a lot to do that to a man of his inner strength and faith. About the only way to strike at him was through Danny, the little hyperactive boy he loved like a son. Trouble was, I'd become emotionally attached to the kid as well. Hurting him was like hurting a real person. If you'll notice, the scene is described obliquely, out of the corner of the eye. It was the best I could do, and actually it works better than a full-frontal exposure. If you let the reader's subconscious fill in the gory details, the effect can be more disturbing than a detailed description.

Like Reborn, the novel starts out with Mr. Veilleur, then switches to a simple groundskeeper… who has a problem with phones…

Reprisal

(sample)

QUEENS, NY

Rain coming.

Mr. Veilleur could feel the approaching summer storm in his bones as he sat in a shady corner of St. Ann’s cemetery in Bayside. He had the place to himself. In fact, he seemed to have most of the five boroughs to himself. Labor Day weekend. And a hot one. Anyone who could afford to had fled Upstate or to the Long Island beaches. The rest were inside, slumped before their air conditioners. Even the homeless were off the streets, crouched in the relative cool of the subways.

The sun poured liquid fire through the hazy midday sky. Not a cloud in sight. But here in the shade of this leaning oak, Mr. Veilleur knew the weather was going to change soon, could read it from the worsening ache in his knees, hips, and back.

Other things were going to change as well. Everything, perhaps. And all for the worse.

He had been making sporadic trips to this corner of the cemetery since he’d first sensed the wrongness here. That had been on a snowy winter night many years ago. It had taken him a while, but he’d finally located the spot.

A grave, which was perfectly natural, this being a cemetery. This grave was not like the others, however. This one had no marker. But something else made this grave special: Nothing would grow over it.

Through the years Mr. Veilleur had seen the cemetery’s gardeners try to seed it, sod it, even plant it with various ground covers like periwinkle, pachysandra, and ivy. They took root well all around, but nothing survived in the four-foot oblong patch over the grave.

Of course, they didn’t know it was a grave. Only Mr. Veilleur and the one who had dug the hole knew that. And surely one other.

Mr. Veilleur did not come here often. Travel was not easy for him, even to another part of the city he had called home since the end of World War Two. Gone were the days when he walked where he wished, fearing no one. Now his eyes were bad; his back was stiff and canted forward; he leaned on a cane when he walked, and he walked slowly. He had an old man’s body and he had to take appropriate precautions.

Age had not dampened his curiosity, however. He didn’t know who had dug the grave, or who was in it. But whoever lay down there below the dirt and rocks had been touched by the enemy… the Otherness.

The enemy had been growing steadily stronger for more than two decades now. But growing carefully, staying hidden. Good thing too, for he had no one to oppose him. But he did not know that. He was waiting. For what? A sign? A particular event? Perhaps the one buried below was part of the answer. Perhaps the occupant had nothing to do with the enemy’s quiescence.

No matter – as long as the enemy remained inactive. For the longer the enemy delayed, the closer Mr. Veilleur would be to reaching the end of his days. And then he would be spared witnessing the chaotic horrors to come. His Heir would shoulder that burden.

A shadow fell across him and a sudden gust of wind chilled the perspiration that coated his skin. He looked up. Clouds were moving in, obscuring the sun. Time to go.

He stood and stared one last time at the bare dirt over the unmarked grave. He knew he would be back again. And again. Too many questions about this grave and its occupant. He sensed unfinished business here.

Because the grave’s occupant did not rest easy. Did not, in fact, rest at all.

Mr. Veilleur turned and made his unsteady way out of St. Ann’s cemetery. It would be good to get back to the cool apartment and get his feet up and have a glass of iced tea. He tried to believe that his wife had missed him during his absence, but with her mind the way it was, Magda probably hadn’t even realized he was gone.

PENDLETON, NORTH CAROLINA

Conway Street had come to a virtual standstill. Like a parking lot. Will Ryerson idled his ancient Impala convertible between fitful crawls in the stagnant morning traffic and watched the heat gauge. Still well in the safe range.

He patted the dash. Good girl.

He glanced at his watch. He’d already had a late start for work, and this was going to make him later. He took a deep breath. So what? The grass on the north campus at Darnell University could wait a few extra minutes for its weekly trim. Only problem was, he was in charge of the work crews this morning, so if he didn’t get there, J.B. would have to get things rolling. And J.B. had enough to do. That was why he’d recently promoted Will.

Will Ryerson is moving up in the world.

He smiled at the thought. He’d always wanted an academic life, to spend his workdays on the campus of a great university. Well, for the last few years his wish had come true. Except he didn’t travel there every day to immerse himself in the accumulated knowledge and wisdom of the ages; he came to tend the grounds.

With his degrees he could have been at Georgetown, or even Darnell or Brown as an academic, but proving his qualifications would require him to reveal his past, and he couldn’t do that.

He glanced in the rearview mirror at his long, salt-and-pepper hair – mostly salt now – still wet from his morning shower, pulled tight to the back, at his scarred forehead, bent nose, and full, graying beard. Only the bright blue eyes of his former self remained. If his mother were still alive, even she might have trouble recognizing him now.

He peered ahead. Had to be an accident somewhere up there. Either that or the road department had picked the town’s so-called a.m. rush hour to do some street repairs. Will had grown up in a real city, the city with the king – no, the emperor of rush hours. This little bottleneck couldn’t hold a candle to that.

He killed time by reading bumper stickers. Most of them were religious.

“BORN AGAIN”

“YOUR GOD DEAD? TRY MINE: JESUS LIVES!”

“LISTEN FOR THE SHOUT – HE’S COMING AGAIN!”

“A CLOSE ENCOUNTER OF THE BEST KIND: JESUS!”

And Will’s favorite…

“JESUS IS COMING AGAIN AND BOY IS HE PISSED!”

I can dig that, Will thought.

He considered turning on the radio but wasn’t in the mood for the ubiquitous country music or the crud that dominated the university’s student station, so he listened to the engine as it idled in the press. An ancient gas guzzling V-8 but it purred like a week-old kitten. It had taken him a while but he’d finally got the timing right.

Will noticed that the right lane seemed to be inching forward faster than his own. When a space opened up next to him, he eased over toward the curb and made slightly better time for half a block. Then he came to a dead stop along with everybody else.

Big deal. He’d picked up fifty feet over his old spot. Hardly worth the trouble. He peered ahead to see if the next side street was one he could use to detour around the congestion. He couldn’t make out the name on the sign. He glanced to his right and froze.

Oh, no.

A telephone booth stood on the sidewalk not six feet from the passenger door of his car.

Not many left these days, and usually he could spot one blocks away. But this had been hidden by the unusually large knot of people clustered at the bus stop next to it. He’d missed it.

Panic gripped the center of Will’s chest and twisted. How close was he? Too close. How long had he been stopped? Too long. He couldn’t stay here. He didn’t need much, just half a car length forward or back, but he had to move, had to get away from that phone.

No room in front – he’d already pulled up to the rear bumper of the car ahead of him. He lurched around in his seat, peering over the trunk. No room there either. The car behind was right on his tail.

Trapped.

Get out of the car – that was the only thing to do. Get out and walk off a short distance until the snarl loosened up, then run back and screech away.

He reached for the door handle. He had to move now if he was going to get away before–

No. Wait. Be cool.

Maybe it wouldn’t happen. Maybe the horror had finally let go. Maybe it was over.

He hadn’t allowed himself near a landline phone for so long, how did he know it would happen again? Nothing had happened yet. Maybe nothing would. If he just stayed calm and stayed put, maybe–

The phone in the booth began to ring.

Will closed his eyes, set his jaw, and gripped the steering wheel with all his strength.

Damn!

The phone rang only once. Not the usual two-second burst, but a long, continuous ring that went on and on.

Will opened his eyes to see who would answer it. Someone always did. Who’d be the unlucky one?

He watched the commuters at the bus stop ignore it for a while. They looked at each other, then at the phone, then back down the street where their bus was stuck in traffic somewhere out of sight. Will knew that wouldn’t last. No one could ignore a phone that rang like that.

Finally, a woman started for the booth.

Don’t, lady.

She continued forward, oblivious to his silent warning. When she reached the booth she hesitated. It was that ring, Will knew, that endless continuous ring that so jangled the nerves with its alienness. You couldn’t help but sense that something was very wrong here.

She looked around at her fellow commuters who were all staring at her, urging her on with their eyes.

Answer it, they seemed to say. If nothing else you’ll stop that damned incessant ring!

She lifted the receiver and put it to her ear. Will watched her face, watched her expression change from one of mild curiosity to concern, and then to horror. She pulled the receiver away from her head and stared at it as if the earpiece had turned to slime. She dropped it and backed away. Another of the commuters – a man this time – began to approach the booth. Then Will noticed the car in front of him begin to move ahead. He gunned the Chevy and stayed on the other car’s bumper as it pulled away.

Will kept his sweaty hands tight on the wheel and fought the sick chills and nausea that swept through him.

Thank God it didn’t happen with cell phones. At least not yet. Only land lines. And he had a pretty good idea of why.

Delve into the darkness here… Reprisal

February

Fatal Error

(includes “The Wringer”)

We’re approaching the End Game.

I’d read a theory by a 19th century a Jesuit named Pierre Teilhard de Chardin that the growth of human numbers and interactions would create a separate consciousness called the noosphere. What if he was right? What if I was fed by every thought, every interaction between every sentient being on the planet. It’s not cyberspace, though cyberspace adds to it. Every email, every Twitter tweet, every Facebook add or app or comment, every chat-room quip, every blog entry or comment, every text message or eBay bid – billions upon billions of interactions every hour, all between sentient beings, and all adding to the noosphere.

The noosphere feeds the Lady. The way to take out the Lady then – and pave the way for the Otherness – is to take out the Internet. And I figured out a way to do it.

That’s the game that’s afoot in Fatal Error. But it’s hardly apparent as we open with a poor guy who’s being put through the wringer…

Fatal Error

(sample)

1

Munir stood on the curb, facing Fifth Avenue with Central Park behind him. He unzipped his fly and tugged himself free. His reluctant member shriveled at the cold slap of the winter wind, as if shrinking from the sight of all these passing strangers.

At least he hoped they were strangers.

Please let no one who knows me pass by. Or, Allah forbid, a policeman.

He stretched its flabby length and urged his bladder to empty. That was what the madman had demanded of him, so that was what he had to do. He’d drunk two quarts of Gatorade in the past hour to ensure he’d be full to bursting, but he couldn’t go. His sphincters were clamped shut as tightly as his jaw.

Off to his right the light at the corner turned red and the traffic slowed to a stop. A woman in a cab glanced at him through her window and started when she saw how he was exposing himself. Her lips tightened and she shook her head in disgust as she turned away. He could almost read her mind: A guy in a suit exposing himself on Fifth Avenue – the world’s going to hell even faster than they say.

But it has become hell for me, Munir thought.

He saw her pull out a cell phone and punch in three numbers. That could only mean she was calling 911. But he had to stay and do this.

He closed his eyes to shut out the line of cars idling before him, tried to block out the tapping, scuffing footsteps of the shoppers and strollers on the sidewalk behind him as they hurried to and fro. But a child’s voice broke through.

“Look, Mommy. What’s that man–?”

“Don’t look, honey,” said a woman’s voice. “It’s just someone who’s not right in the head.”

Tears became a pressure behind Munir’s sealed eyelids. He bit back a sob of humiliation and tried to imagine himself in a private place, in his own bathroom, standing over the toilet. He forced himself to relax, and soon it came. As the warm liquid streamed out of him, the waiting sob burst free, propelled equally by shame and relief.

He did not have to shut off the flow. When he opened his eyes and saw the glistening, steaming puddle before him on the asphalt, saw the drivers and passengers and passersby staring, the stream dried up on its own.

I hope that is enough, he thought. Please let that be enough.

But he was not dealing with a sane man, and he had to please him. Please him or else…

He looked up and saw a young blond woman staring down at him from a third-floor window in a building across the street. Her repulsed expression mirrored his own feelings. Averting his eyes, he zipped up and fled down the sidewalk, all but tripping over his own feet as he ran.

2

The phone was ringing when Munir opened the door to his apartment. He hit the record button on his answering machine as he snatched up the receiver and jammed it against his ear.

“Yes!”

“Pretty disappointing, Mooo-neeer,” said the now familiar electronically distorted voice. “Are all you Ay-rabs such mosquito dicks?”

“I did as you asked! Just as you asked!”

“That wasn’t much of a pee, Mooo-neeer.”

“It was all I could do! Please let them go now.”

He glanced down at the caller ID. A number had formed in the LCD window. A 212 area code, just like all the previous calls. But the seven digits following were a new combination, unlike any of the others. And when Munir called it back, he was sure it would be a public phone. Just like all the rest.

“Are they all right? Let me speak to my wife.”

Munir didn’t know why he said that. He knew the caller couldn’t drag Barbara and Robby to a pay phone.

“She can’t come to the phone right now. She’s, uh… all tied up at the moment.”

Munir ground his teeth as the horse laugh brayed through the phone.

“Please. I must know if she is all right.”

“You’ll have to take my word for it, Mooo-neeer.”

“She may be dead.” Allah forbid! “You may have killed her and Robby already.”

“Hey. Ain’t I been sendin’ you pichers? Don’t you like my pretty pichers?”

“No!” Munir cried, fighting a wave of nausea… those pictures – those horrible, sickening photos. “They aren’t enough. You could have taken all of them at once and then killed them.”

The voice on the other end lowered to a sinister, nasty, growl.

“You callin’ me a liar, you lousy, greasy, two bit Ay rab? Don’t you ever doubt a word I tell you. Don’t even think about doubtin’ me. Or I’ll show you who’s alive. I’ll prove your white bitch and mongrel brat are alive by sending you a new piece of them every so often. A little bit of each, every day, by Express Mail, so it’s nice and fresh. You keep on doubtin’ me, Mooo-neeer, and pretty soon you’ll get your wife and kid back, all of them. But you’ll have to figure out which part goes where. Like the model kits say: Some assembly required.”

Munir bit back a scream as the caller brayed again.

“No – no. Please don’t hurt them anymore. I’ll do anything you want. What do you want me to do?”

“There. That’s more like it. I’ll let your little faux pas pass this time. A lot more generous than you’d ever be – ain’t that right, Mooo-neeer. And sure as shit more generous than your Ay-rab buddies were when they killed my sister on nine/eleven.”

“Yes. Yes, whatever you say. What else do you want me to do? Just tell me.”

“I ain’t decided yet, Mooo-neeer. I’m gonna have to think on that one. But in the meantime, I’m gonna look kindly on you and bestow your request. Yessir, I’m gonna send you proof positive that your wife and kid are still alive.”

Munir’s stomach plummeted. The man was insane, a monster. This couldn’t be good.

“No! Please! I believe you! I believe!”

“I reckon you do, Mooo-neeer. But believin’ just ain’t enough sometimes, is it? I mean, you believe in Allah, don’t you? Don’t you?”

“Yes. Yes, of course I believe in Allah.”

“And look at what you did on Friday. Just think back and meditate on what you did.”

Munir hung his head in shame and said nothing.

“So you can see where I’m comin’ from when I say believin’ ain’t enough. ’Cause if you believe, you can also have doubt. And I don’t want you havin’ no doubts, Mooo-neeer. I don’t want you havin’ the slightest twinge of doubt about how important it is for you to do exactly what I tell you. ’Cause if you start thinking it really don’t matter to your bitch and little rat-faced kid, that they’re probably dead already and you can tell me to shove it, that’s not gonna be good for them. So I’m gonna have to prove to you just how alive and well they are.”

“No!” He was going to be sick. “Please don’t!”

“Just remember. You asked for proof.”

Munir’s voice edged toward a scream. “PLEASE!”

The line clicked and went dead.

Munir dropped the phone and buried his face in his hands. The caller was mad, crazy, brutally insane, and for some reason he hated Munir with a depth and breadth Munir found incomprehensible and profoundly horrifying. Whoever he was, he seemed capable of anything, and he had Barbara and Robby hidden away somewhere in the city.

Helplessness overwhelmed him and he broke down. Only a few sobs had escaped when he heard a pounding on his door.

“Hey. What’s going on in there? Munir, you okay?”

Munir stiffened as he recognized Russ’s voice. He straightened in his chair but said nothing. Monday. He’d forgotten about Russ coming over for their weekly brainstorming session. He should have called and canceled, but Russ had been the last thing on his mind. He couldn’t let him know anything was wrong.

“Hey!” Russ said, banging on the door again. “I know someone’s in there. You don’t open up I’m gonna assume something’s wrong and call the emergency squad.”

The last thing Munir needed was a bunch of EMTs swarming around his apartment. The police would be with them and only Allah knew what that crazy man would do if he saw them.

He cleared his throat. “I’m all right, Russ.”

“The hell you are.” He rattled the doorknob. “You didn’t sound all right when you screamed a moment ago and you don’t sound all right now. Just open up so I can–”

The door swung open, revealing Russ Tuit – a pear-shaped guy dressed in a beat-up Starter jacket and faded jeans – looking as shocked as Munir felt.

In his haste to answer the phone, Munir had forgotten to latch the door behind him. Quickly, he wiped his eyes and rose.

“Jesus, Munir, you look like hell. What’s the matter?”

“Nothing.”

“Hey, don’t shit me. I heard you. Sounded like someone was stepping on your soul.”

“I’m okay. Really.”

“Yeah, right. You in trouble? Anything I can do? Can’t help you much with money, but anything else…”

Munir was touched by the offer. If only he could help. But no one could help him.

“No. It’s okay.”

“Is it Barbara or Robby? Something happen to–?” Munir realized it must have shown on his face. Russ stepped inside and closed the door behind him. “Hey, what’s going on? Are they all right?”

“Please, Russ. I can’t talk about it. And you mustn’t talk about it either. Just let it be. I’m handling it.”

“Is it a police thing?”

“No! Not the police! Please don’t say anything to the police. I was warned” – in sickeningly graphic detail–”about going to the police.”

Russ leaned back against the door and stared at him.

“Jesus…is this as bad as I think it is?”

Munir could do no more than nod.

Russ jabbed a finger at him. “I know somebody who might be able to help.”

“No one can help me.”

“This guy’s good people. I’ve done some work for him – he’s a real four-oh-four when it comes to computers, but he’s got a solid rep when it comes to fixing things.”

What was Russ talking about?

“Fixing?”

“Situations. He solves problems, know what I’m saying?”

“I…I can’t risk it.”

“Yeah, you can. He’s a guy you go to when you run out of options. He deals with stuff that nobody wants anybody knowing about. That’s his specialty. He’s not a detective, he’s not a cop – in fact, if the cops are involved, this guy’s smoke, because he doesn’t get along with cops. He’s just a guy. But I’ll warn you up front, he’s expensive.”

No police… that was good. And money? What did money matter where Barbara and Robby were concerned? Maybe a man like this was what he needed, an ally who could deal with the monster that had invaded his life.

“This man… he’s fierce?”

Russ nodded. “Never seen it, and you’d never know it to look at him, but I hear when the going gets ugly, he gets uglier.”

“How do I contact him?”

“I’ll give you a number. Just leave a message. If he doesn’t get back to you, let me know. Jack’s gotten kind of distracted these days and picky about what he takes on. I’ll talk to him for you if necessary.”

“Give me the number.”

Perhaps this was what he needed: a fierce man.

Three guesses as to the identity of that “fierce man”… Fatal Error

March

THE DARK AT THE END

Glaeken has been holding Jack back from a full frontal assault on Rasalom. After the events of Fatal Error he unleashes Jack, who wastes no time in bringing it to the One.

Here he presents his preliminary shopping list to Abe…

THE DARK AT THE END

(sample)

“Oy. You’re trying to start the next world war?”

“Call me the rovin’ gambler.”

Abe glanced up from the wish list Jack had handed him and offered a puzzled look. “Nu?”

“Were you ever a Dylan fan?”

Abe shook his head. “Neither Thomas nor Bob.”

Jack waved him off. “Never mind then. Take too long to explain.”

He took a bite of his cheesesteak. He’d brought two of them from Vinny’s pizzeria off West Houston. Vinny was a Philly transplant and knew his way around the classic cheesesteak. Jack confessed to being a purist and a minimalist where cheesesteaks were concerned. Razor-thin slices of steak, provolone cheese, fried onions on a sub roll. No peppers, no gravy, and Vinny might do violence to anyone who added mustard or catsup. Jack would help him.

Jack and Abe had laid the torpedo-shaped packages on the scarred rear counter of the Isher Sports Shop, spreading the greasy wrapping paper to reveal the treasured contents, then chowed down. Parabellum, Abe’s powder-blue parakeet, hopped around on the hunt for scraps. The seedless rolls made for slim pickings, so Jack tossed him a sliver of meat. He pounced on it.

Abe, already finished with his first half, had the second clutched in his pudgy fingers, which in turn were attached to pudgy arms connected to a pudgy body. He needed a cheesesteak like he needed herpes, but Jack had given up nannying Abe’s health. Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die. The last part was likely if Rasalom got his way.

Abe closed his eyes and groaned softly as he chewed.

“Why is traif so good?” he said around a mouthful.

“Because forbidden and flavor both start with F?”

“In her grave my mother would turn if she – knew what I was eating.”

“Could be worse.”

“How?”

“She could find out about that Taylor pork roll and cheese with egg on a kaiser you had last week.”

Abe rolled his eyes. “Oy. That might return her from the dead.”

“I’ll never tell.” Jack nodded at the list. “What can you do for me?”

“All right already. What I’ve seen so far is not for everyday home protection. The first thing here, an MM-1… you really want an MM-1? You been watching – what’s that film?”

“Dogs of War?”

“That’s the one. With that meshuggeneh actor…”

“I prefer ‘quirky’ – Christopher Walken.”

“Him, yes. You’ve been watching that movie?”

“No. Not lately.”

But Jack remembered it well. The MM-1 had been the film’s iconic weapon. It looked like a sawed-off shotgun with a huge rotating drum that held a dozen 40mm grenades.

“Then why an MM-1 already?”

“I may have a need for grenades and I want to be able to use them at a distance greater than I can throw.”

“Fine. But this throws a dozen in rapid succession.”

“I’m after a tough bastard.”

“Well, I don’t have one sitting downstairs. I’ll have to call around.”

“Fine, but please get on it ASAP.”

“This is a rush job?”

Jack looked at him. “It’s a long overdue job.”

Abe understood. “That mamzer whose name, like God’s, we shouldn’t say?”

“It’s ‘Rasalom.’ Say his name anytime you feel like it now. I want him to come looking.”

“Not for me, thank you.” He scratched his stubbled chin. “Like I said, the MM-1 itself I don’t have, but rounds to feed it I do. You want HE, I assume?”

Jack nodded. High-explosive grenades, yes – the higher, the better.

“What’s the kill zone?”

“Five meters.”

“Perfect.”

“But…the HE rounds won’t detonate within thirty meters of the launcher.”

Well, he couldn’t allow himself to get close to Rasalom anyway. But just in case it happened…

“Understood. What’ve you got for close range? I’ve heard of Beehives–”

“With the flechettes?” Abe waved his hands. “Those you don’t want.”

Jack had thought shooting a round that held forty or fifty darts might come in handy.

“Why not?”

“Unless you’re very close, the flechettes don’t necessarily land point first. Skip the Beehive. You want the buckshot round. Filled with number-four pellets. Does a nice shredding job close in.”

“Okay. I’ll take four HE and eight shot.”

Abe jotted that down on the list, then went to the next item. His head shot up.

“LX-14? You’re going to trigger a nuclear bomb?”

“Nooo.” Jack had heard it had been used in nuclear weapons but, although he’d have loved to be able to hit Rasalom with a tactical nuke, he didn’t have one. And Abe wasn’t going to find him one. “I just want max of everything – detonation velocity, brisance, everything. And I’m told this is powerful stuff.”

“It is. But as far as I know, it’s made only at Livermore in this country. I’ll see what I can do.” He gave Jack a sidelong look. “You’re changing your last name to Kozlowski, maybe?”

Jack laughed. “Please, no.”

The Kozlowski brothers, Stan and Joe, had been demolition experts, really got off on blowing things up. Damn near blew Jack to smithereens a couple of years ago. But Jack had learned a few things from them… before he blew them up.

Abe squinted at the last item on the list. “If I didn’t know better I’d say this says ‘Stingers.’” He looked up and smiled. “But you couldn’t want–”

Jack was nodding. “Yup. Two of them.”

Abe threw his hands – and the list – in the air as he gestured to the leaning shelves and crowded aisles running toward the front of the store.

“Gevalt! This is a sport shop.”

“What about the armory in the basement? Or did you forget?”

“Small arms I sell. Small. Stinger missiles are not small arms.”

“I figure if one guy can carry it and fire it, it’s a small arm.”

“That’s your definition. Others – like yours truly – would disagree.” He picked up the list and read it again. “You’re sure about this?”

“Absolutely.”

Abe shook his head. “I should maybe not complain about you saving the world, but… ”

“But what?”

He didn’t correct him about the saving-the-world bit. If that happened, fine. But he was out to save Gia and Vicky and Abe and Weezy and Julio and Eddie and a few others.

“This isn’t your style.”

“Why? Because of all the firepower?”

“Yes. With you it’s always up close and personal. This… ” He shrugged again.

“I don’t have a choice, Abe. Get too close to this guy and he can freeze you with a look, paralyze you so all you can do is watch. I’m not giving him that chance. I have to operate from a distance.”

“But surface-to-air missiles?”

“Well…” Jack paused. He’d never told Abe this.

“Well, what?”

“He can fly.”

Abe’s eyebrows lifted halfway to his far-receded hairline. “Like a bird, you mean? Like Superman?”

“No…but he can float. I’ve seen it. I don’t intend to give him a chance to do that. But if he does… he gets stung.”

Abe sighed as he resettled himself on his stool. “I know the world is not what I once thought it to be. Seeing that thing that came out of the Hudson and cut up your chest – how long has it been?”

“Three years this coming summer.”

If summer came. Word was it might not.

Abe shook his head. “Like a lifetime it seems. Anyway, seeing that happen made it abundantly clear that the world is keeping secrets. Not just the kind I thought it was – and is. Currencies and economies and governments are being manipulated, but that’s gornisht compared to what’s really going on, right?”

“’Fraid so. It’s cosmic, dude.”

“Since when you’re a hippy?”

“But it is cosmic.”

“And how do you find this Adversary, as you call him?”

“I hope to pick up his trail tonight.”

“Where? In the cosmos?”

“Nope. New Jersey.”

Jersey again? The Dark at the End

May

NIGHTWORLD

This is the end of the Secret History. Because after Nightworld it’s no longer secret.

Nightworld is an ensemble novel. It’s like Old Home Week with characters from across the Secret History – The Keep, The Tomb, The Touch, Reborn, “Tenants,” and so on. Some live, some die, and some become collateral damage. No one is unscathed as all scores are settled, all debts are paid.

The novel picks up a couple of months after the horrors of The Dark at the End. The Adversary Cycle and Jack’s tale have merged and this is the grand finale. Nightworld ends both narrative tracks, as well as the Secret History itself. More stories remain to be told, but the timeline stops there. I will set no stories after Nightworld.

I have extensively revised Nightworld since its initial publication in the early 90s. Jack’s role has been expanded – he is now a major player – but he remains one of many. Characters who didn’t exist when I wrote the original must be dealt with.

This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but a scream in the dark…

Check out the first many holes in the earth:

NIGHTWORLD

(sample)

Manhattan

The city was getting nuttier by the minute.

Jack ambled past the darkened Museum of Natural History and headed south on Central Park West. On the corner of 74th a bearded guy dressed in sackcloth stood holding a placard. Straight out of a New Yorker cartoon. His laboriously hand-printed sign bellowed “REPENT!” in giant letters at the top followed by a Biblical quote so long you’d have to stop and read for a good three minutes before you got it all.

Yeah, the world might be coming to an end, but spring had sprung, and spring meant baseball, and the start of the baseball season meant it was time once again for the annual Repairman Jack Little League Park-a-Thon. Time to stroll Central Park and tempt the muggers out of hiding so they could give to the local Little League equipment fund. Give till it hurt.

Come to think of it, he’d met Glaeken during last year’s Park-a-Thon.

As he crossed CPW he heard a deep rumble. Thunder? The sky was clear. Maybe a storm was gathering over Jersey.

He entered the park at 72nd Street, got on the jogging path, and continued south. A young teenage couple, certainly not seventeen yet, appeared, faces pale and strained, running like the girl’s father was after them. They weren’t joggers – weren’t dressed for it. In fact, they seemed to be buttoning up their clothing as they ran.

Jack stepped off the path to let them pass.

“S’up?”

“Earthquake!” the boy said, his voice a breathless whisper.

Jack walked on. He’d heard of making the Earth move – he’d had it move for him a couple of times – but it was nothing to panic over. The quake in 2011 had been a non-event.

Half a minute later another guy ran by and said the same thing.

“Where?” Jack hadn’t felt anything.

“Sheep Meadow!”

“But what–?”

The guy was gone, running like a madman.

Curious now, Jack broke into a loping run and cut off the jogging path. He skirted the lake until he reached the wide expanse of grass in the lower third of the park called the Sheep Meadow. He’d heard that real sheep used to graze these fifteen acres as late as the 1930s. In the wan starlight he could make out a ragged, broken line of murmuring people rimming the area. And smack in the center of the meadow, what looked like a pool of inky liquid. But nothing reflected off its surface. A huge circle of empty blackness.

Tar?

Jack paused. Something about that black pool raised his hackles. An instinctive fear surged up from the most primitive parts of his being. He’d experienced something similar when he’d seen his first rakosh. But this was different. This was a hell of a lot bigger.

He forced his feet to move, to carry him toward the pool. He could make out the figures of a couple of people at the edge and they seemed all right, so he guessed it was safe.

As he neared, Jack realized it wasn’t a pool at all. A huge sinkhole, a good hundred feet across, had opened in the middle of the meadow.

He skidded to a halt on the grass.

A hole…

He had a bad history with holes in the Earth during the past couple of years. One in Monroe had almost swallowed him, and another in Florida had released some nasty creatures into the Everglades. Both had been connected with the Otherness, and now the Otherness was on the march.

Maybe this was something else, something innocent.

Yeah, right.

Two guys there ahead of him stood on the edge, laughing, jostling each other. Jack could see they were young, dressed head to toe in black, with spiky hair. He stopped behind them. No way he wanted to get that close.

One of the guys on the rim turned and spotted him.

“Hey, dude, c’mon up here. You gotta see this. It’s fuckin’ awesome, man!”

“Yeah!” said the other. “The mother of all potholes!”

They started laughing and elbowing each other again.

Wrecked.

“That’s okay. I can see all I want from here.”

Which was mostly true. In the wash of light from the tall buildings ringing the lower end of the park, Jack could make out a sheer wall on the far side of the hole leading straight down through the sod, the topsoil, and the granite bedrock. The edge of the hole was clean.

He’d seen pictures of sinkholes before on the news, from places like Guatemala where the underground water had been tapped out. But he’d never seen one so perfectly round. This looked like it had been made with a King Kong cookie cutter. Manhattan’s bedrock – he could almost hear his dear, lost Weezy correcting him that it was call “schist” – was near the surface here. Could sinkholes occur in solid granite? Didn’t think so.

Otherness…definitely the Otherness.

The two kids were still fooling around, dancing on the edge, playing macho games. Jack was moving to his right, away from them, trying to position the light-bleed from Central Park West behind him for a better look, when he heard a yelp of terror.

He saw one of the kids leaning forward over the edge, his arms windmilling. Even from Jack’s distance it was plain he was overbalanced and no longer fooling around, but his buddy only stood beside him, laughing at his antics.

His laughter died with the first kid’s scream as he toppled headfirst into the hole.

“Jason! Oh, shit! Jason!”

He lunged for his friend’s foot, missed it, and Jason disappeared into the blackness. His scream was awful to hear, not merely for the blood-chilling terror it carried, but for its length. The cry seemed to go on forever, echoing up endlessly from below as Jason plummeted into the depths. It never really ended. It simply… faded… out…

His friend was on his hands and knees at the edge, looking down into the blackness.

“Oh, fuck, Jason! Where are you?” He turned to Jack. “How deep is this fuckin’ thing?”

Jack didn’t answer. If this one held true to the others he’d seen, it was bottomless.

He stepped to within half a dozen feet of the kid, got down on his belly, and crawled to the edge. He’d seen light deep down in the others – not a bottom, just light… a hazy violet glow. Maybe he’d see that–

Vertigo hit him like a gut punch as he peeked over and saw nothing but impenetrable blackness.

Jack closed his eyes and hung on. And as he did he thought he could still hear Jason screaming down there… way, way down there… fading…

He felt a slight breeze against the back of his neck. Air was flowing into the hole. Into the hole. That meant it had to go somewhere, be open at the other end. He had a good idea where that might be.

And then the earth began to slide away beneath his fingers, beneath his wrists, his forearms. Christ! The rim was giving way.

Jack rolled to his left and back, away from the edge, but he wasn’t fast enough. A Cadillac-sized wedge of earth gave way and crumbled beneath him. He slid downward toward the black maw. With a desperate, panicky lunge he managed to grab a fistful of turf and hang on. His feet kicked empty air and for one breathless moment he felt eternity beckoning from below. Then the toes of his sneakers found the rocky wall. He levered himself up to ground level and scrambled away from the edge as fast as his rubbery knees would carry him.

When he’d gone a good fifty feet he heard a terrified cry and risked a look back. Jason’s buddy had stayed behind and the edge had given way under him. Most of his body had dropped into the hole. Jack could see his head, see his arms and hands tearing at the grass in a losing effort to hold on.

“Help me, man!” he cried in a voice all tears and terror. “God, please!”

Jack started to unbutton his shirt, thinking he might be able to use it as a rope. But before he was halfway done, a huge clump of earth gave way beneath the kid’s hands and he was gone, leaving behind only a fading high-pitched wail.

More earth sloughed off and fell away, narrowing the distance between Jack and the edge. The damn hole was getting bigger.

He looked around. The few people who had been scattered around the perimeter of the Sheep Meadow were now fleeing for the streets. Good idea, Jack thought. A fine idea. He broke into a headlong run and followed them.

And as he ran it occurred to him that a big chunk of Central Park was missing. What was it Glaeken had said last night?

Will you reconsider if Central Park shrinks?

Sure, he’d said.

Jack didn’t remember his high school geometry, so he couldn’t even guess the surface area of that hole, but a helluva lot of the Sheep Meadow was missing. Which meant the park was smaller by that many square feet.

…if Central Park shrinks…

Jack picked up his pace. How had Glaeken known?

He shook his head. Stupid question.

More holes ahead – and they don’t stay empty for long… Nightworld

TIMELINE

A chronology of births and deaths and major events in the Secret History

THE PAST

Prehistory – "Demonsong" – Rasalom’s first death

Srem assembles her Compendium

The Great Cataclysm ends the First Age

1476 – Rasalom trapped in the Keep;

1498 – Torquemada encounters the Compendium of Srem

1563 – on one of his inspection trips to the keep,

Glaeken seals the Compedium and other “forbidden” books there

1890 – Ernst Drexler Sr born

1923-24 – “Aryans and Absinthe”

1926-45 – Black Wind – the Gaijin Masamune is damaged at Hiroshima

1927 – Jonah Stevens loses left eye in Great Lower Mississippi Valley Flood

1930 – Jack’s father born

1931 – Jack’s mother born

1941 – early April – Jasmine "Jazzy" Cordeau impregnated with a human clone

1941 – May 3 - The Keep – Rasalom killed – invades the clone in Jazzy

1941 – (June) Alexandru sells Compendium & other books to a Bucharest dealer

1941 – Jonah Stevens has visions instructing him to care for the Vessel

1942 – (Jan 6) the Vessel (a human clone) born to Jazzy

1942 – Compendium sold to American collector

(Feb) Jonah and Emma Stevens adopt the Vessel from St. F's – name him James

1946 – Walter Erskine born in Chillicothe, MO

1949 – Ernst Drexler II born

1950 – Jack’s father trained as US Army sniper by Sgt. Nacht

1959 – Tom Jr born

1961 – Kate born

1962 – Jack's father gets vasectomy

1968 – Feb. 10 Reborn: Rasalom conceived in Monroe,

causing a cluster of freaks (Conspiracies and "Faces")

Feb. 11 - Dr. Hanley crashes

Mar – Dat Tay Vao enters Walt Erskine

April – Jack conceived

Sept – Weezy Connell born

Nov 7 – Rasalom reborn in Hickory Hill, AK

1969 – Jan – Jack born

Feb – Mrs. Clevenger moves into Johnson, NJ

April – Walter Erskine’s sister’s (Adelle) husband

Kurt Bainbridge transferred from Kansas, City, MO to his company’s Trenton office; knew Jack’s Dad in Korea (calls him “Killer”); moves to Johnson for the trout and bass fishing; provides home for his brother-in-law but not crazy about idea.

Oct – Eddie Connell born

SOMETIME IN THE EARLY 1970s – Jonah Stevens’s kids: Hank born in January; Jeremy 11 mo later in Dec; Moonglow / Christy born following Dec.

1970 – 24-yr-old Walt Eskine gets medical discharge

from Army after treated for a mental condition at Northport V.A. Hospital. Diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic. Thinks he can heal people.

1972 – Walt joins a faith-healing tent show in the South

but kicked off the tour because he is never sober.

1974 – Walt comes to live with sister in Johnson, NJ

1975 – American collector killed and robbed of Compendium (Jonah Stevens)

1975 – Luther Brady receives Compendium after graduation from college

1979 – Jonah Stevens killed in elevator accident.

1981 – Tom starts Seton Hall Law

1982 – Kate spends Junior Year abroad in France.

1982 – Walt Erskine in DC for march to Vietnam Veterans Memorial dedication

1983 – Aug: Jack: Secret Histories

Sept: Kate starts UMDNJ (Jack: Secret Circles)

Oct: Jack: Secret Vengeance

YEAR ZERO MINUS SIX:

Walt Erskine moves briefly to New York; meets Martin Spano

YEAR ZERO MINUS FIVE:

The THEN sections of Reprisal end with Danny Gordon buried (late December)

YEAR ZERO MINUS FOUR:

Bill Ryan ends up on West End in Bahamas (January)

YEAR ZERO MINUS THREE:

SIBS (February)

"Faces" (early summer)

THE TOMB (summer)

"The Barrens" (ends in September)

"A Day in the Life" (October)

"The Long Way Home"

LEGACIES (December)

YEAR ZERO MINUS TWO:

Bill Ryan becomes Will Ryerson and returns to US

CONSPIRACIES (April) (includes "Home Repairs")

ALL THE RAGE (May) (includes "The Last Rakosh")

HOSTS (June)

THE HAUNTED AIR (August)

GATEWAYS (September)

CRISSCROSS (November)

INFERNAL (December)

YEAR ZERO MINUS ONE

JANUARY

Harbingers

APRIL

early – Dawn Pickering conceives (Bloodline)

Alan gets Dat-Tay-Vao / Walter Erskine dies (The Touch)

MAY

(late) By the Sword

Dawn escapes Mr Osala; Jack meets Glaeken and they retrieve the Gaijin Masamune

JULY

Alan’s house burns on a Monday

(later) 2 Kickers (“Sammy”) found dead in Manhattan of a host of diseases and avulsed intestines (Touch)

Jack reconnects with Weezy, the Lady dies a 2nd time (Ground Zero)

AUGUST

The Touch ends

Rasalom settles in Pendleton, NC as Rafe

SEPTEMBER

“The Peabody-Ozymandias Traveling Circus & Oddity Emporium” ends

OCTOBER / NOVEMBER / DECEMBER

The Order develops the Jihad virus

Rafe/Rasalom begins at seducing Lisl

YEAR ZERO

JANUARY

Dawn's baby boy is late

Rasalom – in Pendleton, NC

FEBRUARY

Rasalom – in NC setting up Ev and Lisl

Renny Augustino – in NC tracking Bill Ryan; then in NYC with Bill to dig up grave in St. Ann’s Cemetery; meets Glaeken and they burn remains

Glaeken goes to NC where Rasalom kills Renny and discovers Glaeken is mortal (Reprisal ends)

Fatal Error end with the Lady terribly wounded but still alive

MARCH

The Dark at the End: Jack goes back to Johnson to find the old sigil w. Rasalom’s Other name (first seen in Jack: Secret Circles)

Rasalom steals the Gaijin Masamune and uses it to kill the Lady for the 3rd and final time, thus paving the way for the Otherness.

MAY

Nightworld begins

SUMMARY

The Secret History of the World at a glance

The Past

“Demonsong” (prehistory)

“The Compendium of Srem” (1498)

“Aryans and Absinthe”** (1923-1924)

Black Wind (1926-1945)

The Keep (1941)

Reborn (February-March 1968)

“Dat Tay Vao”*** (March 1968)

Jack: Secret Histories (1983)

Jack: Secret Circles (1983)

Jack: Secret Vengeance (1983)

“Faces”* (1988)

Cold City (1990)

Dark City (1991)

Fear City (1993)

Year Zero Minus Three

Sibs (February)

The Tomb (summer)

“The Barrens”* (ends in September)

“A Day in the Life”* (October)

“The Long Way Home”+

Legacies (December)

Year Zero Minus Two

“Interlude at Duane’s”** (April)

Conspiracies (April) (includes “Home Repairs”+)

All the Rage (May) (includes “The Last Rakosh”+)

Hosts (June)

The Haunted Air (August)

Gateways (September)

Crisscross (November)

Infernal (December)

Year Zero Minus One

Harbingers (January)

“Infernal Night”++ (with Heather Graham)

Bloodline (April)

By the Sword (May)

Ground Zero (July)

The Touch (ends in August)

The Peabody-Ozymandias Traveling Circus & Oddity Emporium (ends in

September)

“Tenants”*

Year Zero

“Pelts”*

Reprisal (ends in February)

Fatal Error (February) (includes “The Wringer”+)

The Dark at the End (March)

Nightworld (May)

* available in The Barrens and Others

** available in Aftershock and Others

*** available in the 2009 reissue of The Touch

+ available in Quick Fixes – Tales of Repairman Jack

++ available in Face Off

also by F. Paul Wilson

The Adversary Cycle

The Keep

The Tomb

The Touch

Reborn

Reprisal

Nightworld

Repairman Jack

The Tomb

Legacies

Conspiracies

All the Rage

Hosts

The Haunted Air

Gateways

Crisscross

Infernal

Harbingers

Bloodline

By the Sword

Ground Zero

Fatal Error

The Dark at the End

Nightworld

Quick Fixes – Tales of Repairman Jack

The Teen Trilogy

Jack: Secret Histories

Jack: Secret Circles

Jack: Secret Vengeance

The Early Years Trilogy

Cold City

Dark City

Fear City

The LaNague Federation Series

Healer

Wheels Within Wheels

An Enemy of the State

Dydeetown World

The Tery

Other Novels

Black Wind

Sibs

The Select

Virgin

Implant

Deep as the Marrow

Mirage (with Matthew J. Costello)

Nightkill (with Steven Spruill)

DNA Wars (formerly Masque with Matthew J. Costello)

Sims

The Fifth Harmonic

Midnight Mass

The Proteus Cure (with Tracy L. Carbone)

A Necessary End (with Sarah Pinborough)

Definitely Not Kansas (with Tom Monteleone)

Short Fiction

Soft & Others

The Barrens & Others

The Christmas Thingy

Aftershock & Others

The Peabody-Ozymandias Traveling Circus & Oddity Emporium

Quick Fixes – Tales of Repairman Jack

Sex Slaves of the Dragon Tong

Editor

Freak Show

Diagnosis: Terminal

The Hogben Chronicles (with Pierce Watters)

Omnibus Editions

The Complete LaNague

Calling Dr. Death (3 medical thrillers)