Dog Days

by John Levitt

  But the important thing, at least for those of us they hang with, is that they all possess a nearly infallible antenna for danger, coupled with a blinding loyalty that is mostly undeserved. Louie has an almost supernatural ability—I guess I should leave out the “almost”—to sense danger long before I even have a ghost of a clue.

  Lou has other unexpected talents. I don’t think most practitioners recognize the true potential of an Ifrit. They accept them as special—wonderful magical companions, certainly more than pets—and more loyal than the best friend you ever had. But I think Ifrits are more than that. Unless it’s just Lou. He is different from other Ifrits. Take last night—he must have picked up on whatever was happening in the alley the minute I started walking down it. My apartment is at least two miles from the alley and he covered that distance in under five minutes. Usually all that he needs to do is to warn me of impending trouble. This time he’d actually had to do something about it. This morning, he looked smug. Of course, a dog eating bacon will always look smug, but today he definitely had an extra swagger.

  There was one thing he couldn’t help me with, though. What was that whole thing last night about? I’d been keeping a low profile the last few years, ever since I’d quit the enforcement squad. Five years had been enough. Even when I was working with them I’d never got into anything really heavy. More like, “Hey, don’t do that again,” than anything else. I had no enemies, at least no more than anyone else. Certainly not enough to account for last night. That wasn’t someone trying to scare me or teach me a lesson. That was someone who wanted me dead.

  I had no information to work with, so I put it out of my mind. The very thought of how much work and hassle it was going to take to figure it out made me tired. I didn’t feel like going out, especially since the house of a practitioner is about as safe a place as he or she is going to find.

  At about two the mailman shoved a bunch of letters through the mail slot by the side of the door. They scattered over the floor and when I picked them up, the only interesting thing was a postcard invitation to a party in North Beach from Pascal. As usual, he added a P.S., “Be there or be square.” He thought it was funny. Pascal was well into his seventies, old enough so that not only did he not use e-mail, he didn’t even like the telephone. He liked sending postcards. The only trouble was that half the time his invitations arrived after the party was over. It didn’t really matter though; people always managed to get the word. This one was for tomorrow night. Ordinarily I would go, since there were always interesting people at his affairs, a nice mix of musicians, practitioners, Starbucks barristas, and politicos. And young women. Always women. But of course, I had a gig.

  I spent the rest of the afternoon practicing scales, something I rarely do, but for once it was soothing. At nine I headed out to Rainy Tuesdays. I still had to make a living, and you can’t bail on a gig just because of personal problems. Besides, I felt like playing. I briefly considered taking Louie along, but naturally they don’t allow dogs in the club, and I could hardly explain that he wasn’t exactly a dog.

  Rainy Tuesdays is a new upscale club in the Mission that is trying to establish itself as a premier jazz spot. As a result, they pay some decent money, at least for San Francisco, and Tommy Willis had landed a regular weekend gig. Tommy knew he could count on me to replace Cal. That’s one of the good things about jazz—if one of the band members flakes out, you don’t have to cancel the gig—you just plug in a replacement and forge ahead. Of course, the better the group, the harder it is to find a player with the chops and talent to cut it.

  Luckily for Tommy, I was good. In fact, I was better than Cal Simmons, his regular, and Tommy and I both knew it. But I do have two drawbacks—I don’t like to practice and I get bored easily. The longest I’d ever played with one set of musicians was about six months, and there was a sense of mutual relief when I left.

  I do make a great fill-in, though. I hate to brag (actually I don’t) but there’s a good reason I’m the first call for any jazz group in San Francisco that needs a guitar player to fill in. I know just about every standard by heart, sight read like a clarinet player, and can play most anything by ear after hearing it once. And as a result, I actually earn enough money from gigs to avoid having a day job.

  Rainy Tuesdays is a nice space—small enough to connect with the crowd; big enough, hopefully, to survive financially. It has a lot of small tables, a big curved bar with a black leather rail at one end, and a killer sound system, all wrapped up in an industrial retro look. A small stage rests in the middle of the main room, lodged against the back wall, raised maybe half a foot. There’s room for close on two hundred people and tonight it was half-full. They say that jazz is making a comeback in San Francisco, but I think the jury is still out on that one.

  I got to the club about nine thirty and found a parking spot a lot closer than I had the night before, half into a red zone, but if I got a ticket so be it. I had no intention of walking through the late-night streets after what had happened.

  We were set up and ready to play by ten, about standard for clubs these days. Apparently people who go out to hear music don’t have day jobs. Or maybe it’s because nobody sleeps much anymore. We got through the first set in fine style. Tommy, who certainly is a monster on alto even if he is a geek, had stretched out on “Giant Steps” and wowed the crowd. That was great for him, but that’s the problem playing with a band where the leader is a horn player. All of his showcase tunes, including his originals, are nightmares for a guitar player. Still, Tommy was the draw, a real up-and-comer. The crowd certainly hadn’t come because I was on the bill, so I guess it was only fair that he play whatever tunes made him sound the best.

  After the set ended I wiped down my guitar and headed toward the bar. I don’t usually drink when I’m playing a serious gig—it helps you relax but it also tends to make your playing sloppy. I picked up a Calistoga water and leaned back against the leather rail, surveying the crowd. Most of them were twentysomethings, younger than the usual jazz crowd, which was nice. Maybe jazz really is making a comeback. Several of them stopped by to compliment me on my playing. Actually, I wasn’t at my best that night what with worrying and all, but I long ago learned to simply say, “Thanks. Glad you enjoyed it.”

  When I first started playing out, there were times when I knew I was playing like crap. When I got the “Gosh, loved your playing” speech, I had to bite my tongue to keep from saying back, “Really? I thought I sucked,” or, “You don’t know much about jazz, do you?” It finally came to me that those who had ears were simply being polite and I should probably do the same. And to those who didn’t, well, a cynical response is just flat-out insulting.

  Most of the jazz buffs drifted away and I was left chatting with Manny, the bass player, and idly scanning the room. On one wall hung the club logo: raindrops and a stylized umbrella done in blue neon tubing, very hip. Right underneath, at one of the small round tables, sat an attractive young woman. She was playing abstractedly with her hair, which was wavy dark with purple highlights, shoulder length. She wore no jewelry except for a thin silver band on the third finger of her right hand. I could see it as she fussed with her hair. Slim, medium height, dressed midway between casual and stylish in soft Levi’s and a black top. An interesting face, not exactly beautiful, but close enough.

  She was sitting alone, which is no easy feat for an attractive woman in a nightclub. Rainy Tuesdays, unlike a lot of clubs, is a place where most of the crowd actually comes to hear the music. But there are always those who are mainly there to try to hook up, who could care less who or what is playing, even with a cover charge and drinks at seven bucks a pop. I noticed one of those types easing his way toward her table. She looked up briefly and glanced at him, not hostile, but cold. I could feel the chill all the way across the room. The guy kind of stumbled, recovered, and made a smooth sideways escape, heading toward the bathrooms as if he had never had any other destination in mind. Manny had been watching along with me
, and he glanced at me out of the corner of his eye.

  “Wow,” he said, lifting off heavy black-framed glasses and peering nearsightedly at me.

  “Go ahead, you hit on her,” I encouraged. “You don’t really need those balls of yours anymore, do you?” He gave me a raspberry and wandered off in search of more agreeable company.

  I picked up my bottle of water and headed over toward her table. When I had almost reached it, she looked up. Her eyes, a light gray, reflected a grave expression with just a hint of a smile behind them. There was no coldness there, no indeed. Instead, I glimpsed a warmth and spirit and depth that took my breath away. Nothing sexual, but something even more seductive, the feeling of instant rapport you sometimes get with another person, the feeling that here is someone you might actually be able to spend your life with, an instant connection of compassion and understanding. And underneath, right below the surface, a faint sensuality hovering, just waiting to be ignited into raging passion by precisely the right person. I stood there for a moment luxuriating in the feeling and then, regretfully, made a quick hand gesture and a sort of a cough. Her features blurred, and then there was nothing more than an attractive woman sitting at a table. I kissed her cheek, pulled up a chair and sat down across from her.

  “Sherwood,” I said. “Very nice, very nice indeed.”

  “I’ve been practicing,” she said. “Remember, the last time I tried sending? You told me I could look forward to a promising career as a high priced hooker. I’m working on being a little more subtle.”

  “Very nice,” I repeated. “Textured. Very three-dimensional. Of course, you’ve got a solid foundation to work with.” She leaned back in her chair and regarded me warily.

  “Was that a compliment or a dig?” she asked. “It’s not always easy to tell with you, Mason.”

  “Just the facts, ma’am.”

  She laughed. “You know, if it didn’t take so much energy to maintain the illusion, I might be able to keep a boyfriend for more than a few months.”

  “Speaking as a few months guy, that pretty much goes without saying for all of us.”

  “We lasted, what, almost a year?”

  I nodded. “Probably a record for both of us.”

  We sat there for a while without saying anything. I wouldn’t say that it was an entirely comfortable silence, but we hadn’t parted on bad terms. It was just a little odd. I hadn’t seen Sherwood for about a year now, and although she liked jazz well enough, I knew she hadn’t come down to the club just to hear the music. I finally broke the silence.

  “Not a coincidence, is it?” I said.

  “What?”

  “You showing up tonight.”

  She gave me a look, half-innocent, half-quizzical. “Something I should know about?”

  I shrugged. “Is there something I should know about?” I countered.

  She shook her head resignedly, a habit I remembered well. “My, but aren’t we cryptic tonight?”

  “Sorry,” I said. “Somebody tried to kill me last night. It tends to make one a bit testy.”

  The look on her face told me a lot. There was concern there, but not surprise. So, her being here wasn’t coincidence at all. Great, this was just what I needed. Something complicated. She reached across the table and placed her hand on top of mine.

  “A mugger?” she asked hopefully.

  I shook my head. “No such luck.”

  “What then?”

  “I don’t have the time to go into it right now,” I said, “but it wasn’t exactly run of the mill.”

  She nodded slowly. “Actually, that’s why I came down here tonight. Not that I knew anything had happened to you, but there’s been a lot of ‘not run of the mill’ going around lately. I know how you feel about Victor, but I think you might want to talk to him.”

  I looked at her without expression. “Couldn’t I just opt for a trip to the dentist instead?”

  “Come on, he’s not that bad.”

  “Oh? Compared to who?”

  Her face took on that familiar long-suffering expression that I seem to elicit from a lot of people. “Why do you have to have such a thing about him?” she asked, tiredly.

  I took a sip of my water, put my elbows on the table, and thought about it.

  “Well, let me see. First of all, he’s a control freak. He’s a great believer in keeping the magical world in check so that it doesn’t run roughshod over the rest of society, which is fine, but when he regards himself as the head honcho of—what did we call it?”

  Sherwood chuckled. “The MBI—Magical Bureau of Investigation. But not within earshot of Victor.”

  “No, he doesn’t have much of a sense of humor, does he?” Another strike against him. Victor holds firmly to the belief that life is a very, very serious matter, and everyone should act accordingly at all times.

  “Well, maybe if you hadn’t made that joke about Wilson…”

  Sherwood was referring to a particularly ill-advised comment I’d once made about a practitioner who had accidentally turned himself inside out during a spell gone awry.

  “How was I to know Wilson was a friend of his,” I said, defensively. “But I don’t like the way he pretends to be in charge, either. We all know Eli’s really in charge. If it weren’t for the fact that Victor is able to finance everything, since he has more money than God, Eli wouldn’t put up with his airs for a moment.”

  “You’re not the boss of me,” Sherwood muttered just loud enough for me to hear. I didn’t rise to the bait.

  “I don’t think that’s entirely true,” she continued. “Victor does make a great chief of staff, you know. And Eli may have the final say on things, but you’ll notice he never uses it. I love him dearly, and he’s brilliant, but he’s not what you would call…grounded, is he now? Without Victor there wouldn’t be any enforcement.”

  She was right. As usual. Eli is liable to go off into theoretical speculation at inappropriate times, like when someone is trying to kill him. He spends much of his free time working on what he calls his “special project.” I don’t know exactly what it is, but I would bet it has absolutely no practical application. So he needs someone like Victor. Technically, Eli is in charge, but much as I hate to admit it, the reality is that Victor runs things. That’s one of the reasons we don’t get along. I do have a problem with authority.

  “Okay,” I said. “Whatever. Does Victor have to refer to us as a ‘strike force,’ though?”

  Our job had been to ensure that those practitioners without a moral compass of their own were still required to walk the straight and narrow. Mostly it was just stuff like reining in low-level talents who use their powers to run scams on the unsuspecting, but once in a while some truly dangerous situations come up.

  And although I’d never admit it to Sherwood, in a lot of ways, I actually do respect Victor. Some remarkably unpleasant people roam the world, many of whom possess considerable reserves of talent. Some of them are even into what is commonly termed “black magic,” although that’s mostly for show, and dealing with those types takes a lot of balls, not to mention some major ability. Victor was born to the job. Somebody has to play cop and keep the bad guys in line, and better him than me.

  “Anyway, most of it’s your fault,” I said.

  Sherwood choked on her drink, though whether from indignation or laughter I couldn’t tell.

  “Of course it is,” she said mildly. “But how so?”

  “You two were close friends before Eli recruited me, remember? Then, after a while, when Victor’s anal retentive side got to be too much even for you, things between you cooled off and he blamed me for the change.”

  “He does think you were a bad influence on me.”

  “Fair enough, since I think he’s the bad influence.”

  Sherwood sat silently for a couple of seconds, staring down and idly stirring her drink, then looked up and said, “By the way, Vaughan was killed last week.”

  I sat up straight, not sure I was hearin
g right. “Vaughan? Vaughan Harris? Our Vaughan?”

  She nodded, studying my face. I couldn’t believe it. We hadn’t been close, but Vaughan was the smartest, the quickest, and probably the most skilled of all the enforcers. This was not good at all.

  ”What happened?” I asked.

  Sherwood shrugged and made a palms up, fingers spread gesture with her hands. “You really ought to talk with Victor about it. I’ve been away and don’t know the entire story.”

  “He couldn’t bother to come down in person?”

  “He thought I might have better luck.”

  “Nobody ever said Victor was stupid.”

  Sherwood laughed, but without much humor. “Yeah. Well, Eli really wants you to come by, too.”

  “Oh,” I said. That was a different matter.

  I glanced over toward the bandstand and caught Tommy signaling impatiently with little hand gestures.

  “I’ve got to play another hour or so,” I told her. “Can you wait?”

  She nodded. “Of course.”

  I stood up to leave and she reached out and put her hand on my arm. She paused, looked down for half a second, and when she looked up the shimmer was back, playing over her face.

  “Loved your playing,” she breathed adoringly.

  “Yeah, you suck, too,” I said, and ambled back to the stage.

  Tommy started off with a slow blues, which gave me time to think. He gave me a couple of sideways glances to let me know he could tell I was just phoning it in, but I ignored him. You can’t always be at the top of your game.

  I’d met Sherwood some years back. She is a practitioner of course, working with Victor, and I had been brought in to join the team. I only lasted a couple of years before I finally got fed up with it and went back to playing music exclusively. It just wasn’t me.