Dean hadn't bothered with the "hot" handle on his shower that morning.
Roxy made the same cameo she'd made Saturday night—some cackling, some shaking, rattling, and rolling, and then disappearing. Both Sam and Dean agreed that she probably still hadn't gotten over the dispersal yet, but that come Friday, she'd probably be back to full-tilt-boogie haunting mode.
Sam had also found some lore about New York City ghosts, most of whom appeared to be famous people: Theodore Roosevelt, an NYPD commissioner before he was President, haunting the old police headquarters; Mark Twain haunting the place where he used to live at on West Tenth Street; Alexander Hamilton all up and down Jane Street, on the block where he died following his fatal duel with Vice President Aaron Burr; Burr's own ghost in the Barrow Street restaurant that now stood where a carriage house he'd lived in was; and, of course, John Lennon in the Dakota, the apartment building where he was assassinated. Sam assumed, and Dean agreed, that a lot of this was New York hype. There wasn't anything about Riverdale in general or this house in particular, or about women in band T-shirts screaming for people to love them.
For lack of anything better to do while Sammy was researching, Dean had read up a bit more on Percival Samuels. He had to admit, for a con artist, the sonofabitch was good. He put on a great show for his clients—which was good, 'cause they paid through the nose for it. That show didn't hold up if you paid attention, though. Even Dean knew that Hecate, Osiris, and Morrighan were gods from three different pantheons (Greek, Egyptian, and Celtic), and Loki was from a fourth (Norse) and wasn't the god of love and redemption. But it probably sounded cool to the rubes who didn't know any better, the same way that the psychics you saw on late night television sounded cool to the folks who missed all the reading tricks and leading questions. For the nine hundredth time he cast a longing gaze at the radio—he'd found a local classic rock station, and it didn't even suck that badly—but he knew that blaring music would be a mistake. Headphones wouldn't improve things, as he needed to be able to hear if something bad happened—like, say, Sam screaming for help, or demon noises, or some other damn thing.
So he sat in silence, and waited.
Dean really hated waiting.
Finally, Sam came out of one of the apartment buildings, looked around to see if anybody was on the street, saw two people walking north on Webster, and then wandered slowly toward them, head down.
The two people were talking to each other, and each had one ear bud from the same iPod in their ears. They didn't even notice Sam, but he still waited until they turned up Bedford Park Boulevard before stopping, turning, and jogging across the street to the Impala.
"Nothin'," he said as he slumped into the passenger seat, slamming the large door shut. "I've checked both apartment buildings. There's that one other place over the auto parts store."
"What about the store?" Dean asked.
"Which one?"
Dean shrugged. "Any of 'em."
"I don't see it. Cars didn't exist in Poe's time. If it's gonna be something that has an emotional connection to Poe's life and work, it'd have to be in one of the apartments."
"A sidewalk near a college campus isn't in any of Poe's stories either, is it?"
Sam frowned.
Dean shifted in his seat so he was facing his brother. "The thing with the orangutan happened on a street—it was in an apartment in the book, though, right?"
"Yeah."
"So obviously our nut job is willing to fudge it to get the location right. Hell, for all we know, that garage over there has a big-ass pendulum in it."
Sam rubbed his chin the way he did sometimes when he wanted to make Dean believe that he was thinking. Dean never bought that, because he knew Sam was thinking all the time. No, this was Sam stalling.
"All right, then—why don't you check out the garages, and I'll take the last apartment building?"
Dean just blinked and stared for a second.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing, I'm just shocked that you came up with a plan that doesn't suck."
"Hardy har har."
Grinning, Dean climbed out of the car, as did Sam.
After making sure all the doors were locked, Dean jogged over to the garage with the big yellow sign saying MANNY'S CAR REPAIR on the corner of 199th, even as Sam went around the corner—the entrance to the apartments over Manny's was on the numbered street, perpendicular to Webster. Dean assumed that Sam would wait for someone to walk out and make like he was a resident coming in at the same time—or just ring a doorbell and do the "I'm your neighbor, I forgot my keys" routine. The speakers on these buildings were so crappy that Sam could probably pull it off without too much trouble. Besides, he had that whole earnest thing going for him. People trusted Sam, which was another reason he liked having him along for hunts.
During the day, Manny's probably had the door wide open so cars could pull in. Now, though, the big metal garage door—which was about three car lengths wide—was shut, with a chain securing a thick metal bolt on either side of the door. Looking up, Dean saw that the door raised and fell automatically, which meant that he would need a remote to open it, even if he could pick the lock securing the chain to the dead bolts. Squinting in the dim light provided by the streetlight several feet away—there was a closer one, but it wasn't working—Dean saw that the chains were secured with one of the new special locks that were supposed to be harder to break. In the real world, that meant that with good light it would take him fifteen minutes to pick them instead of the usual two. He probably could pull it off, but he'd already had the cops called on him once, and this garage door was considerably more exposed than the side door to that house had been, and he'd have to pick two locks, which would take forever. Not worth the risk.
Then he noticed the small door inset into the garage door, which only had a regular key lock for a standard dead bolt. He knew he could open that in half a second.
As always, Dean marveled at how stupid people could be sometimes. They'd spend thousands of dollars on an alarm system, but then never change the code from the default provided by the company—or worse, would change the code to something obvious like their birthday or the house's address or something. Or they'd have four locks on the door, but leave the front window wide open because it was too hot. People were better at the illusion of security than they were at actually being secure.
And the owners of this garage were just as bad. Peering through the very small, very filthy windows of the garage door, Dean could just make out several cars, and the big locks that kept them safe from being stolen. But by leaving a door like this with just a crap lock on it, an enterprising thief could easily break in and make off with the smaller pieces of equipment or car parts that were there for the asking.
Reaching into his jeans pocket, he took out his lock pick and within seconds had the small door open.
At which point a loud beeping noise started, loud enough to make Dean's eardrums vibrate. Looking around quickly, he located the alarm code pad, ran to it, saw which model it was and knew that it only required a three-digit code, and entered the garage's cross street: 199.
The beeping stopped as soon as he hit the enter button. Let's hear it for stupid people!
With the alarm silenced, he jogged back to the door and shut it. No sense in advertising that there's a break-in. The only cop he wanted to encounter this trip was McBain. Dean considered leaving some kind of memento of his presence, just as an object lesson to Manny and his employees that their security sucked. Back when he was a kid, about eleven years old, he used to go looking for cars that had "No Radio in Car" signs on them. He'd take a removable radio, of a type that was very popular at the time, and throw it as hard as he could at the car window with a note wrapped around it that read, "Now you have one". Really, did anyone think that sign would actually stop people from breaking into their cars?
"Ow, fiddlesticks!" someone screamed from the back room, just as something metal crashed to the floor.
; Dean's eyes went wide. Fiddlesticks?
Slowly, removing the pistol tucked into the back of his jeans, he moved toward the back room, past two Geo Metros and a Prius. For a brief instant he gazed longingly at the Prius—not so much for its elegance, as it was a truly butt-ugly vehicle, but for the hybrid car's gas mileage. The Impala had many virtues, but it also guzzled gas like a sonofabitch, and at anywhere from two to three bucks a gallon, it was becoming increasingly difficult to keep her fed.
Once he got past the Prius, he saw that there was a flashlight waving around a back room. That room had an almost closed door with the word office stenciled in faded gold letters on a grease-streaked window. Dean slowly walked up to the door, and saw a short guy with a patch of baldness on his crown surrounded by thin brown hair. The guy was kneeling down with his back to him, so that was all he could see of him, but he could also see that the guy was spreading some kind of dust on the office's red Oriental rug. He was wearing a brown polyester suit that wouldn't have been out of place on a used car salesman or a weekend golfer.
The man was chanting something under his breath. Dean didn't recall anything this guy was doing as part of Samuels's ritual, but that didn't mean it wasn't.
Kicking the door open, he thumbed off the pistol's safety and said, "Don't move."
To his credit, Ugly Suit Guy immediately stopped chanting and held up his hands, which were wearing grime-covered latex gloves. "Please, it's very important that you listen to me. I understand that I have broken into your place of business, but if you do not let me complete this ritual I have started, someone will die. There is a madman out there killing people in an attempt to resurrect the dead, and I must stop him before he kills again!"
Dean frowned. That wasn't the reaction he was expecting.
Then the guy turned around, and Dean recognized the big nose, small eyes, thin lips, and cleft chin from the Poe enthusiast's website.
"You're Arthur Gordon Pym."
The beady eyes went as wide as they could. "I'm afraid you have me at a disadvantage, sir—unless you are the Manny indicated on the sign for this—"
"Just shut up a sec, okay, Artie? And yeah, I do have you at a disadvantage, 'cause I got the gun. I also know that your real name is Arthur Mackey, that you live here in the Bronx, that you own Pendulum Pit Inc., and that you're the one trying to resurrect Poe, so cut the crap, okay?"
Very slowly getting to his feet, and, Dean noticed, being careful not to move suddenly, Mackey said, "I can assure you, sir, that I have no intention of resurrecting anyone. Edgar Allan Poe is quite dead, and I'm content to leave him that way. I've seen resurrected corpses before, and they're—" Mackey shuddered. "—rather disturbing."
Remembering the zombie chick who broke Sam's arm, Dean sympathized, but he wasn't ready to believe this goober just yet. "How do you know about the resurrection spell?"
"I learned of it at the Walsh Library at nearby Fordham University, actually. I am quite curious as to how you know of it—and who you are."
"Yeah, well, keep wonderin', 'cause I still got the gun and—"
The sounds of "Smoke on the Water" emitted from Dean's pocket. Then it stopped, then it started again.
Keeping the pistol cocked in one hand, he reached into his pocket with the other and flipped open the phone: two missed calls from Sam, which meant either he got crappy cell reception around here or Sam was signaling to him that he was in trouble and needed his help but couldn't actually talk on the phone.
After mulling for half a second, Dean waved his pistol. "Get up, Artie, you're comin' with me."
"Please, sir, I need to locate the killer before—"
"If these calls mean what I think they mean, my brother's already found the killer."
Mackey's thin lips pursed to the point where they pretty much disappeared. "Your brother?"
Grabbing the lapels of Mackey's ugly jacket, Dean yanked him out of the office. "Just move your ass, Artie."
Dragging Mackey across the garage, Dean went back to the front door.
"Sir, I must protest this treatment. If your brother—whoever he is, and whoever you are—have found the killer, I'll be happy to come with you and assist in whatever meager way I can, but—"
Dean stopped, turned, and put the muzzle of the gun under Mackey's chin. "Do you ever shut up?"
Mackey swallowed, his Adam's apple sliding across the muzzle.
Letting out a snarl, Dean lowered the pistol, thumbed the safety back on, and stuck the gun back in his pants before going back onto the street. That was another reason to avoid getting the attention of any member of the NYPD not named McBain—the handgun laws in this state were among the nastier in the country. Of course, with the murder charge, it was the least of his worries, but it was also the kind of thing that drew attention. They walked quickly down to the corner and then to the front door that Sam was supposed to have gone through.
Dean's concerns about how to get in that door were taken care of pretty quickly when he saw that Sam was standing in the doorway, propping the door open with his foot. He also wasn't moving, but Dean could hear someone talking.
Staring down at Mackey, he put his finger to his lips. Mackey nodded and stayed a step behind Dean as they both quietly moved up the small staircase to the front door. Dean took out his pistol. Screw the handgun laws, if someone's messing with my brother.
Sam was talking now, holding his hands up in a non-threatening position. His Treo was palmed in his left hand, which was probably how he'd signaled Dean. "Look, I understand what you're going through, but—"
"And I'm tellin' you right now that it ain't right what the right is doin' to this country, it ain't right, and the right's gotta know what's right, 'cause it ain't right, you feel me? Do you? Do you?"
"Of course I do, now just please, sir, put the gun down."
Crap. From the sounds of it, some looney-tunes with a gun was off his meds and taking it out on Sam. They didn't have time for this crap. Dean walked up behind his brother and next to him. He could see, now, that there was a bald African-American man wearing an undershirt and boxer shorts and waving a revolver around fast enough that Dean couldn't tell if it was cocked or not. He didn't particularly want to find out the hard way that it was. The man was pacing back and forth across the narrow hallway, right next to a metal door that was ajar.
"Sam?" Dean said, his own pistol pointed right at the guy's smooth head as he went back and forth.
"Who that? You 'nother one? 'Nother one from'a gummint? I ain't listenin' to no more from you white folks with your pills an' your gummint an' your doctors and none 'a that! Flushed them pills down the toilet, let the alligators at 'em, that's what I did. Don't be tellin' me I need no pills for nothin'!"
"Sir," Sam said in his most reasonable voice, "I can assure you that we're not from the government. We're trying to stop a killer, and—"
"So, what, you cops? Don't like me no cops, cops be takin' me to the hospital, an' they be givin' me the pills! I don't take that, you feel me?"
"No, sir, we're private investigators. We've been hired to find a killer because the cops couldn't handle it."
"Damn right, the cops can't handle it. No cops in no town don't know nothin' 'bout nothin'."
"But, sir," Sam said, "we can't catch the killer unless you let me and my partner in."
Dean winced. Sam hadn't seen Mackey yet, and he hoped that this guy didn't bust a gasket when he found out Sam had two partners.
"Maybe you can help," Sam said. "If you help us, you'll be a hero."
That, finally, got the guy to stop pacing, which, if nothing else, gave Dean a clearer shot. "A hero? Like Superman?"
"Exactly, sir, like Superman. You'll stop a horrible killer and you'll be in the newspapers and on tele vision."
"That'd be good. I like television. 'Cept the news, don't like that, but Oprah's cool. She knows what's happenin', she knows what's right, not like the right don't know what's right."
"Sir, can you tell me if any of the a
partments in this building are empty?"
Dean glanced at his brother, wondering if Sam was really expecting a straight answer from this garbanzo.
"They say they empty, but they lie, I know what goes on up there. Up in 2B, they say they ain't nobody there, but I know they plannin', they plottin', they doin' all sortsa stuff up there, I'm tellin' you right now, it ain't right what the right's doin', and they be doin' it in 2B, that's for damn sure, I'm right about that right now!"
"Okay, thank you, sir." Sam lowered his arms. "If it's okay, we're gonna go check out Apartment 2B, okay?"
"It ain't right what the right be doin' right up there, you feel me?"
"I know, sir," Sam said, "I know, that's why we're gonna stop it."
"You be tellin' those news people, it was Omar that done help you. Ain't no last name, though, 'cause that be my slave name that the right gave me, and they got no right to be doin' that to my rights, you feel me?"
"Absolutely, Omar. We'll tell the news people you helped us catch the killer that the cops couldn't."
Omar nodded so fast Dean thought his head would fall off. "Damn right. Damn cops. Damn straight, those damn cops couldn't find no damn nothin'."
"Thank you, Omar. We really appreciate it."
"No sweat, my brother. You get that killer and show the right that they don't got the right to be givin' nobody no pills that they don't be needin'."
Sam gave Omar a quick nod. "We will."
"Good."
With that, Omar went through the metal door and slammed it shut.
Dean let out a breath he hadn't even realized he was holding. "Well, that was fun."
"We must hurry," Mackey said.
Sam turned around and looked down the stoop at Mackey, who was putting on a fresh pair of latex gloves. "You're Arthur Gordon Pym."
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