I drove by the Brain Wash Café, a place where lonely souls could congregate to post messages in cyberspace while washing and drying their clothes and sheets. Those with other interests hung out at the Crypt, which had a full array of S&M toys for sale.
Ohmigod, there was a parking space! I squeezed my vehicle into a spot that was a bit too small, pushing those in front and back out of the way. Then I wandered down the street searching for Randy Edgers’s building. I finally found the concrete structure, which resembled a bunker more than anything else. Edgers’s name was on buzzer 410, just as Santou had said it would be.
I rang, but received no answer. Call me a cockeyed optimist. I kept right on ringing.
“What the hell do you want?” a voice finally wailed, made even more screechy by the cheap intercom.
“It’s Rachel Porter. We met last night.”
“Sorry, babe, but I’m way too tired to party right now. Why don’t we hook up later on?”
“I’m the woman who was with Lily’s father at the club.”
That produced a long pause. I broke the silence by buzzing some more.
“Oh, shit. What are you bothering me for?”
“We need to talk.”
“Look, I don’t care who you are. This isn’t a good time. Now you’d better get outta here.”
“I’m not going anywhere. Just so you know, Lily’s father isn’t with me. I came alone. If you’re smart, you’ll let me in.
“What are you, nuts? If I’m smart, I won’t,” came his snappy retort. “I’m going back to bed now. You can talk to me in my dreams.”
So be it. I decided to see how well he could snooze with my finger glued to the doorbell. I held it down, creating one continuous nerve-jangling ring. It took less than a minute to produce the desired effect.
“You bitch! I swear to God, that’s it. I’m calling the cops,” threatened the frazzled voice crackling through the squawk box.
“Go ahead. In case you’ve forgotten, my friend is with the FBI, and I’m law enforcement as well.”
“Oh man. This is total bullshit,” Edgers groused. “All right. Come up and let’s get this thing over with.”
Those were my sentiments exactly.
The metal door buzzed open and I hoofed it up four long flights of stairs. Edgers stood waiting at the entrance to his space. To say he looked like death warmed over would have been paying the kid an undeserved compliment. He wore only a pair of dirty boxer shorts that were on the verge of falling off his scrawny hips. It provided me with way too good a look at his sunken chest, stooped shoulders, and skinny legs. He would have made mighty sparse pickings, even for a desperate vampire.
Edgers stepped aside and I brushed past him to enter a room as dark as a cave. Tattered brown curtains hung over the windows, keeping any light from coming through. I only hoped the scattered mounds on the floor weren’t the remains of anything animal or human. I did my best to skirt around them just in case. A couple of heat lamps were shining in one corner. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have been able to see anything at all in his den.
The moment of truth arrived as I grabbed hold of the filthy brown material and pulled it aside, allowing the sun to come pouring in.
“What the hell are you trying to do? Blind me?” Randy grumbled, covering his eyes.
Maybe he was part vampire, after all. Edgers’s complexion was sickly white even without makeup. The light revealed a face that was badly pitted with acne.
“For chrissakes, I didn’t get to bed until four o’clock this morning. This is like the middle of the night for me,” he complained.
“Maybe you should get on a better schedule,” I suggested, glancing around—not that there was much to look at.
Most dungeons were furnished better than this place. There was no sofa, no table, not even a bed. Maybe the lack of furniture was to showcase the one and only object that Edgers had spent his money on: a large black lacquered coffin with its lid flung open.
I walked over and peered inside to spy a thin layer of foam rubber that had been crudely cut to fit. However, even this make-do mattress was in the process of deteriorating. Small pieces of hardened yellow foam lay scattered about like stale bread crumbs, caught in the folds of a stained sheet thrown on top.
It was then I spotted a few other items in the room. One was an aquarium containing a number of small, fuzzy mice, all huddled together like shell-shocked victims. Hmm. Dracula’s manservant, Renfield, had taken to eating bugs. Maybe Edgers was surviving on rodents.
But what really aroused my interest was a much larger glass tank that sat positioned near the sun lamps. A cardboard box with a hole at one end had been placed inside, while crumpled newspapers and wood chips lined the floor.
I reached in and tap, tap, tapped on the box top. A moment later, a large lizard’s head popped out. Then the creature, itself, appeared.
A venomous reptile, the Gila monster was about eighteen inches long with a blunt face, powerful jaws, four short legs, and a stout body. Its black skin was beautifully mottled with an intricate design of spots and pink bars. Small beadlike scales covered its back like some expensive, tres chic accessory. The only things this creature had that a Kate Spade handbag lacked were a forked tongue and very sharp claws.
One thing I knew to be true was that when a Gila monster bit you, it damn well didn’t like to let go. The other was that Edgers needed a state permit to own one.
“Nice pet you’ve got there,” I commented.
“Who, Lucifer? Yeah, I like him. He used to scare the shit out of Lily, though,” Edgers related with a chuckle.
“Maybe that’s why she left you,” I said, taking full advantage of the opening.
Randy simply shrugged at my suggestion.
“Okay then, what do you think happened?”
“What are you? Some kind of shrink? I already filled you in on everything last night.”
I seriously doubted that.
“You know what I find hard to believe? That Lily would have run off with another guy. After all, she left home to be with you, right?”
“Yeah, well there’s no accounting for some women’s taste,” Edgers replied, hitching up his boxer shorts.
They immediately fell back down, like a pair of low-slung hip-huggers, as Randy made his way across the wooden floor. I wondered if he had some lizard in him, as well. His bare feet were parched and cracked, and his toenails were long and yellow.
I watched in silence as Edgers reached into the small aquarium and picked a fuzzy mouse up by its tail. Then he walked in my direction, with the terrified mouse squirming and wriggling in the air.
What’s he going to try to do? Scare me? I wondered in amusement.
My only regret was that Edgers didn’t also have a tail, so that I could dangle him in midair and see how he liked it.
But any feelings of humor instantly vanished as Edgers suddenly bent down and, with a quick snap of his wrist, slammed the rodent’s head against the floor. After that, he continued to carry the dazed mouse toward me.
I said nothing, too angry to speak, as Edgers laid the tiny creature at my feet. He picked up a pair of utensils near the cage. One was a snake stick, the other a forceps. Edgers opened the aquarium top and deftly thrust the stick behind the lizard’s neck, pinning it in place. Then he retrieved the still breathing mouse and, with the forceps, shoved it inside Lucifer’s mouth.
My stomach twisted at the first sickening gnash of bones that were crunched beneath its powerful jaws. Then my nausea swiftly turned to rage.
“Maybe the problem is you weren’t man enough for her. Could that have been it, Randy?”
What do you know? Edgers did have some blood in him, after all. A hint of color rose in his cheeks as his skin flushed.
“I guess that’s why she took off with someone else. Because you weren’t able to fully satisfy her.”
Randy’s jaw visibly tightened, as if he were holding back words that were burning to come out.
“But
hey, it’s not your fault if you couldn’t please her. Some men just have performance problems, is all,” I continued on, purposely doing what I could to needle him.
Edgers clenched his fists, making me wonder if he was going to take a swing at me. However, he remained stoically silent, so I decided to try a different tactic.
“You know what I really think?” I asked, sidling up close to him. “Lily must have done something to piss you off, and you probably made her pay for it. I’m even beginning to wonder if Lily might be lying dead somewhere.”
“For chrissakes, what the hell’s wrong with you? I didn’t do a damn thing to her!” Randy exploded. “That bitch left me. I’m the injured party here.”
“All right, I believe you,” I tried to appease him. “But Lily’s not in Santa Cruz, is she?”
Edgers glared at me, keeping his lips tightly closed.
Maybe it was the mouse. Or perhaps it was thoughts of Rebecca. But the next thing I knew, I had Edgers up against the wall.
“I’ll ask one more time. Is she in Santa Cruz, or not?”
I added a little incentive by slamming my palm under Randy’s chin and smacking his head hard against the plaster.
“Okay, okay! You’re right. She’s not. Last I heard, she was hanging out with some old tattoo nut in the Haight.”
“That’s not good enough,” I warned, beginning to apply pressure to his trachea with my forearm. “I need an address.”
“I don’t have one,” Randy blurted, gasping for air.
“Gee, that’s too bad,” I responded, refusing to let up until Edgers began to gag and squirm just like the mouse that he’d fed to Lucifer.
“But I know the name of his store. It’s a place called Big Daddy’s Body Shop,” Edgers managed to sputter, his face turning red as a blood clot.
I loosened my grip and he stumbled away.
“You crazy bitch! What were you trying to do? Kill me?”
“No. I just wanted to stun you a bit like you did to that mouse. You’re lucky there’s nothing around here to feed you to, otherwise it would be way too tempting. Tell me something, though. I’m curious. If Lily left, why did you cover for her last night? Why not tell her father where she went?”
He tenderly rubbed his throat. “Because I hate fags even more than I do her,” Randy sneered. “Why should I help him? Let him find Lily on his own.”
Edgers was one lowlife, miserable slimeball. Lucifer blinked at me as if in agreement.
“One other thing, Randy. You’d better be telling the truth, or I’ll be back to take that lizard away from you.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Edgers croaked, still massaging his throat. “That’s private property. You can’t do that.”
“Sure I can. It’s illegal to buy Gila monsters taken from the wild. And I’m willing to bet you don’t have a permit to prove that Lucifer was purchased from a legitimate breeder.”
With that I strolled across the floor, and walked out the door, slamming it hard behind me.
Twelve
I’d heard about Haight Ashbury as a kid. How could I not have? It had been glorified in songs and movies. There was also all the paraphernalia once thought to be so cool—leather vests, peace signs, water pipes, black-light posters, incense, and assorted psychedelia. That was one reason I hadn’t quite known what to expect when I’d first landed in San Francisco. Just one quick stroll through the Haight had been enough to discover that it was now a glorified walk through a Disneyfied world of hippiedom.
I parked my Ford on Cole Street and got out. Once again, I was not disappointed. Teens with long hair and tie-dyed shirts wandered about smoking doobies, just as their predecessors had done nearly forty years ago. However, since then a few other things had changed.
Who would have dreamt there’d be a Gap, a Banana Republic, and a Ben & Jerry’s near the corner of Haight and Ashbury—once the heart of the anti-establishment rebellion? But that was nothing compared to all the souvenir shops blatantly packaging and hawking the counter-culture experience.
It was impossible to walk past a store window without being bombarded by countless images of may-he-party-on Jerry Garcia. The Grateful Dead had become so successful that they were now looked upon as deities in the land of crass commercialism. The only things more numerous than the Jerry Garcia T-shirts and posters were all the panhandlers and Charles Manson look-alikes roaming the streets. I passed one man who so resembled the former Pied Piper of misfits that he actually gave me the creeps.
“How about some spare change for a condom so that I don’t breed?” was his clever panhandling line.
I figured he had a point, and gave him a dollar.
The Haight is also a mecca for used clothing. Vintage stores beckoned to me with their array of cast-off garments at rip-off prices. But it was the Piedmont that really lassoed my attention. Decorating its window were micro miniskirts, long vinyl gloves, faux fur bikinis, and fabulous feather boas. There were even gold metal bras with the words SLUT and BITCH spelled out on them in rhinestones. The store was every drag queen’s dream, reminiscent of La Cage Aux Folles on acid. I made a mental note to tell Terri all about it.
A little farther down the block stood a sandwich board in the middle of the sidewalk announcing a list of daily piercing specials. Sunday was for ear rims, while Monday was for nostrils. Either service could be had for the price of twenty bucks. Tuesday’s specialty was tongue piercing, and Wednesday’s bargain was for eyebrows. On Thursday you could have a ring put in your navel for only thirty dollars. Friday was considered prime time, being the lead-in to the weekend—or the perfect occasion to kick back and have your nipples pierced. Last but not least was Saturday, also known as date night. What could be more fun as a couple than to have someone pierce your lips?
I looked up at the awning and my suspicions were confirmed. I’d arrived at Big Daddy’s Body Shop. Opening the door, I walked inside.
Bzzzzzzz!
By the sound of things, I’d either entered a crazed dentist’s office or stumbled into a giant beehive. I followed where the noise led.
Sitting behind the counter was a tattoo artist wearing what appeared to be a miniature blowtorch attached to his arm. The machine was held in place with straps of Velcro. Next to him was a man who was naked from the waist up. Talk about your living, breathing work of art. The guy was a human canvas—one that looked as though he should have been locked behind bars.
His pumped-up muscles were engraved with a network of cobwebs, their gossamer filament littered with skulls. Perforation marks encircled a thick, beefy neck, along with instructions that read CUT HERE. Just for fun, hot and cold faucets had been tattooed over both nipples. However, the illustrated man didn’t end there. My eyes traveled down his chest, and I took a deep breath as they came to rest on his washboard abs. A gruesome graveyard covered every bit of flesh, with a different name chiseled on each of the headstones.
The man stared straight ahead, as if in a trance, while the inking gun screamed in glee. So intense was its buzz that I could have sworn the electrical current passed from the needle straight into me. A whisper of a smile flitted across Mr. Canvas’s lips, as though the pain were sheer ecstasy.
I tore my attention away from the tattooed Frankenstein and focused on the artist responsible for his illustrations.
The first thing I noticed was the size of the man’s hands. They were massive, with fingers long and tapered. I realized where I’d seen similar ones before—on Michelangelo’s sculpture of David. I could only assume that this must be Big Daddy.
He wore his hair tightly pulled back in a ponytail, further emphasizing the fact he was going bald. As for his nose, it was regal and aquiline, showcasing a profile that should have been on a coin. A beard covering the lower half of his face was so thick and full that it looked like a mask. But the deep-set eyes were the key to the man, himself. They never once wavered from their work.
I watched in fascination as another illustration now began
to take life. A black panther started to slither down Mr. Canvas’s arm, one sleek limb at a time. The feline looked so realistic that its supple muscles fairly rippled beneath the hide.
Big Daddy constantly dabbed at the man’s arm with a sponge as his needle worked like a sewing machine, piercing the skin at 2,200 times per minute. He finally acknowledged me with the hint of a nod, though he still didn’t bother to speak.
I decided to pass the time by looking around his shop. The room itself was interesting, with pillars all about. One had a sign posted on its surface, and I wandered over to read what it said. What I hadn’t expected was a history lesson. But that’s exactly what I got.
I learned that Egyptians had once used double pillars as symbols of protection at their entrance gates. One pillar had been designated Tat, denoting strength, the other Tattu, meaning “to establish.” However, Tattu had a second interesting significance—as a gateway to the region where the mortal soul is blended with an immortal spirit.
“Can I help you?”
The deep, melodious voice took me by surprise. It wasn’t at all what I’d expected as I turned to find Big Daddy. There was no question but that he definitely lived up to his name. The man was tall enough to make me feel small standing beside him.
“Are you interested in having a tattoo done?” he inquired, as I continued to study him. “There are any number of interesting patterns to choose from. Or, if you like, one can be custom-designed. However, my specialty is freehand technique, which is what most of my customers seem to prefer.”
I should have expected the question, but it caught me off guard. There were any number of reasons why I’d never considered a tattoo before, though one in particular stood out above all the others. It had to do with my grandmother’s history. She’d received a tattoo as a young woman. However, it hadn’t been by choice. She’d been a prisoner in a concentration camp.
Even now, I recalled the engraved numbers on her withered skin. I used to take hold of her forearm and run my fingers over them. She would push my hand away and pull her sleeve down, saying there were some things in this world too horrible for any child to know about. It wasn’t until later that I’d learned what the numbers had meant.
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