Known Devil

by Matthew Hughes

  Calabrese drank some more blood from his glass. “But all that other stuff is for humans. If they wanna put it in their veins, or their noses, or their lungs – that’s their problem. But I’m not gonna sit back and let our own kind get hooked on this new shit, like a bunch of fucking warm-bloods.” He looked at me. “No offense.”

  I just shrugged. You can only be offended by those you respect.

  “So you’re OK with pot, coke, and heroin,” Karl said. “But Slide’s bad, because supernaturals can get hooked on it.”

  “Fuckin’ A right,” Calabrese said. “It’s bad for morale, bad for discipline, and bad for business.”

  “Speaking of business,” I said, “You got hit pretty hard the last couple of nights. You gonna be able to keep these guys from taking over?”

  “I got plenty of soldiers left,” Calabrese said. “Besides, the Delatassos lost a few, too.” He grinned. “Thanks to you and me.”

  The urge to put my fist through his face was growing stronger, and I didn’t know how much longer I’d be able to resist it. I drained my coffee cup and pushed my chair back.

  “I assume it doesn’t matter to you,” I said, “whether the Delatasso soldiers are in the ground or in jail.”

  Calabrese spread his hands. “Don’t make any difference to me, long as they’re off the streets.”

  I nodded. “I’ll see what we can do about that. In the meantime, it might be good if we had a way to stay in touch.”

  Calabrese looked at Loquasto and nodded. The consigliere produced what looked like a business card and wrote something on the back. Handing it to me, he said, “That’s my private number. You can reach me there anytime, day or night.”

  I put the card in my pocket and stood up. “Thanks, Counselor,” I said. Then I looked at Calabrese. “There’s not gonna be a war in the streets. Not in this town – I won’t let it happen.”

  He gave me a sharp-edged grin. “Hey – I’m a man of peace, Detective. Ask anybody.” Then he stopped smiling. “Maybe you’d better talk to the other guys – and good luck with that.”

  “Being lucky is one of the things I do best.”

  Back at the squad room, Karl went to brief McGuire on our meeting with the local Mafia, and I went downstairs to see Rachel Proctor, the Department’s Consulting Witch.

  When I got to Rachel’s office, the door was open, as it often is. She was sitting with her back to me, watching something on her laptop. I figured I’d better announce myself – startling a witch is never a good idea, even one who practices white magic like Rachel.

  I rapped on the frosted glass that makes up the door’s top half. Without looking up, she said, “Come on in, Stan.”

  Rachel’s body may be a size 2 – she barely tops five feet and is lean as a whippet – but both her brain and heart are generously proportioned. Whatever the Department pays her, it’s not enough.

  As I got closer, I saw that she was looking at one of those “TED Talks” lectures that Christine is always telling me about. “Who’s doing this one?” I asked her.

  “It’s some professor from MIT, going on about the physics of magic,” she said.

  “I didn’t know you were good at physics,” I said.

  “I’m not – maybe that why this thing is giving me a headache.”

  “How’d you know it was me at the door – witchcraft?”

  “Uh-uh. You’re the only one who ever knocks.”

  She logged off the computer and then swiveled her chair around to face me. “What can I do you for, Stan?”

  “You ever hear anything about Slide?” I asked her.

  “Slide? Isn’t that a dance? I think I saw David Hasselhoff try it on Dancing with the Sidhe a while back.”

  “It might be a dance,” I said, “but it’s also a drug – a bad one.”

  She sat back and looked at me, all levity gone from her face. “A street drug, by the name.”

  “Uh-huh. Brand new – or damn nearly.”

  “I would have thought that modern science had already figured out just about every way there is to fuck people up with chemicals,” she said. “What’s this one do?”

  “Not much – unless you’re a supe.”

  “A drug that affects supernaturals? Get outta here…”

  “I’ll leave if you want – but I’d rather stick around and talk about this drug.”

  “Still funny as a cold sore, I see.” She gave me a tiny smile, which is more than my feeble witticism was worth.

  “We’re not just talking about goblins here, are we?” she asked.

  “No – elves, for sure. And I have on good authority that it works on vamps and weres, too.”

  “Goddess between us and all harm,” she said softly.

  “And maybe other species of supes, too,” I said. “I don’t know anything about that – but then, until two days ago, I’d never heard of Slide, either.”

  “What are the effects of this stuff?”

  “I can tell you how it affects elves – at least, according to the elf who told me about it.”

  “So, tell me about the elves, then. For starters, how do they ingest it?”

  “My guy told me that he and his pals smoked it,” I said . “Although he claims to know some elves who shoot up with it, too.”

  “What happens after it’s in their bloodstream?”

  “He described it as being like fireworks going off inside your head – every color in the universe, and some from outside it.”

  Rachel tapped her chin a few times. “Sounds like an LSD trip, although that stuff affects different people in different ways.”

  “It’s not a hallucinogenic like acid,” I said. “You don’t start seeing purple vultures coming out of the walls, far as I know. Just the flashing lights, at first.”

  “Then what?”

  “Euphoria that apparently goes on for hours.”

  “And what happens after that?” she asked. “Is there an emotional letdown – a crash – or do they return to normal, or what?”

  “The elf didn’t say, and I forgot to ask,” I said. “Shit. But I can try to talk to him some more about it, if you think it’ll be helpful.”

  “’Try?’”

  “He’s probably lawyered up by now, which means he may not have a lot to say anymore – to me, at least.”

  Rachel stood up and went around to perch on the edge of her desk, arms folded, staring at the floor. After a few moments, she said, “Are you sure it’s physically addictive, Stan – not just habituitive?”

  “Oh, it’s addictive, alright. My new buddy Thor–”

  “Who?”

  “Sorry. That’s the elf we busted. He was showing all the signs of a strung-out junkie: sweating, hands shaky, and a good amount of physical discomfort. Kept yelling for a doctor to come in and ‘give him something’.”

  “Sounds like he’s got a monkey on his back, alright.”

  “Besides, when’s the last time you saw somebody commit armed robbery to get money for marijuana?”

  Rachel’s eyebrows shot up. “Armed robbery?”

  I told her how Thor and his pal tried to take down Jerry’s Diner while Karl and I were on our coffee break. When I was done, she said, “I see what you mean about the robbery. That’s certainly an act of desperation, which usually accompanies addiction. Not the kind of thing you see with marijuana smokers.”

  “True – but I did know a pothead who tried armed robbery, once.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “He took down a bakery – guy had the worst case of munchies I’d ever seen.”

  She shook her head. “You just don’t quit, do you?”

  “Sorry – it’s reflexive.”

  “If you didn’t come down here just to tell bad jokes – and I hope you didn’t – then why did you stop by, Stan? I mean, it’s good to know about this new drug, but what do you want from me?”

  “I want to know if you can cure it.”

  She showed me the kind of look you
give to a slow third-grader. “You can’t cure a drug, Stan – it’s not sick. It simply is.”

  “I meant, cure the addiction.”

  She put her hands into the pockets of the long skirt she was wearing and took a slow stroll over to the window. Looking through the dirty glass, she said, “Addiction is an individual matter and has to be treated individually. Some magic practitioners have been able to treat addicts successfully, but many other people get good results from the more mundane arts, such as psychotherapy.”

  She turned from the window and looked at me. “You know how many therapists it takes to change a light bulb, Stan?”

  “How many?”

  “Oh, just one – but the bulb has got to want to change.”

  I winced. “What’s that, Rachel – payback for all the dumb jokes I’ve inflicted on you?”

  “Maybe,” she said with a smile. “If so, it represents only a down payment.” Then she dropped the smile and said, “But it does contain a core truth about curing people – whether through magic, therapy, or medicine. The patient has to desire to be cured. And with addiction, you know, that’s not always the case.”

  “But if you had an addict who wanted to stop using whatever drug he was hooked on, you could help him kick it?”

  “I haven’t done a lot of that kind of thing myself,” she said. “But yes, probably. Of course, I’ve never tried to cure a supernatural. Goblins tend to take care of their own, for better or worse. And until ten minutes ago, I didn’t even know that the other members of the community were vulnerable to addiction.”

  “I don’t know if all the other varieties of supernaturals are capable of getting hooked on this shit. The only species I know about for sure is elves – but the intel about vamps and weres comes from a pretty reliable source.”

  “Mind if I ask who?”

  “Don Pietro Calabrese, his own self.”

  Her eyes widened a little. “The Vampfather? And you think he’d tell you the truth about anything?”

  “He would, when it’s in is best interest,” I said. “As it seems to be this time.”

  “I hope you’re right,” she said. “OK, I’ll send out some feelers among the local witches about this new drug – if I hear anything useful, I’ll pass it on.”

  “Thanks, Rachel, I appreciate it.”

  I was heading for the door when she called me back. “Stan!”

  “What?”

  “If you have the opportunity, I’d really like to get a sample of this Slide to study. I want to see if I can figure out its chemical properties – might help if I have to attempt any curing spells later.”

  “Alright,” I said. “I’ll see if I can get some for you.”

  “Thanks. What are you going to do, in the meantime?”

  “Try to stop a war.”

  So an elf and a goblin walk into a bar – sounds like the start of a joke, right? But what happened at Fred’s Original Bar and Grill that night was no joke – especially as far as Fred was concerned.

  Once Karl and I got back to the squad room, we briefed McGuire on our conversation with Calabrese and Loquasto. The boss made notes as we spoke and said he was thinking about putting together a briefing for all shifts of detectives, to let them know that their jobs had become even more complicated.

  Not long afterward, a call came in, and Karl and I caught it. Normally an armed robbery isn’t the business of the Occult Crimes Unit, but this one seemed to be a little unusual. It wasn’t until we talked to Fred that we found out just how unusual it was.

  Fred was actually Frederick Tapley, Junior. He’d inherited the bar from his old man, Fred Senior, who’d died about twelve years ago. Why the father had bothered to call the place Fred’s Original Bar and Grill was beyond me – I didn’t think he’d had to worry much about people ripping off the name.

  It was a little after 3am, which meant the place had closed for the night about an hour ago. That’s one way you can tell the “human” bars from the “supe” bars. Although the law says you can drink wherever you want, regardless of species, most people – as well as those who aren’t – tend to prefer the company of their own, especially when they’re relaxing. So, although bars catering to supes tended to stay open until dawn, the ones with a mostly human clientele usually closed around 2.

  I know the owner of every supe bar in town, but I’d never met Fred Tapley before, since his place catered to humans. He was a big guy, with a thick mustache and brown hair combed forward in a vain attempt to hide a hairline that was not so much receding as it was in full retreat. A couple of Robbery detectives, Pryce and Dalton, were already taking his statement. After exchanging nods, Karl and I joined them – I figured it would save Tapley some trouble, and save us some time, by not making him tell the story twice. Dalton performed introductions, then told Tapley to go on with what he was saying.

  “I got the last customer outta here just before 2,” Tapley said. “That was Ritchie Patinka, one of my regulars. When he comes in, which is most nights, he always stays till closing. I guess I can understand why – his wife is the original psycho bitch from hell – but I ain’t gonna let him spend the night here, for Chrissake. So, like, ten minutes later, I’m sweepin’ up, when there’s a knock at the door. I yell, ‘We’re closed! Come back tomorrow!’ and go back to my sweepin’. But the knockin’ don’t stop. So, in case the guy didn’t hear me the first time, I take in a good breath and this time I fucking bellow it: ‘WE’RE CLOSED. GO HOME!’”

  “But the knocking didn’t stop?” Pryce asked him.

  “Fuckin’ A right, it didn’t. It keeps on, like I never said nothing at all. I figure it’s some drunk who got kicked outta another bar at two o’clock and decided to try his luck here, ‘Closed’ sign or no ‘Closed’ sign. So, I figure I’m gonna have to tell him to his face. So I pick up Fats, in case he’s gonna be, like, belligerent, and go to the door.”

  Dalton looked at him. “Fats? I thought you said you were alone.”

  “I was,” Tapley said. He took a couple of steps over to the bar and picked up a two-foot-long piece of sawed-off pool cue. “This is Fats – short for Minnesota Fats. I keep it under the bar, in case somebody gets a little too feisty, you know? Usually just showing it is enough to quiet a guy down, even if he is half in the bag. I’ve only had to use it for real a couple of times.”

  “Alright, fine,” Pryce said. “So you and Fats here go to the door, and…?”

  “And I open it, of course. Well, there’s a fuckin’ elf standing there. And the second thing I notice is that the bastard’s got a greenie with him.”

  “You mean a goblin?” Pryce asked.

  “Yeah, right – a fuckin’ goblin. Like I said, that’s the second thing I notice. The first thing is the cut-down shotgun the elf is holdin’ – and it’s pointed right at my chest.”

  “Did either of them say anything at that point?” Dalton asked him.

  “Yeah, the elf tells me, ‘Back the fuck up.’ So I do. Then he says ‘Drop the bat.’ Stupid bastard doesn’t even know the difference between a bat and a pool cue.”

  “I assume you complied anyway,” Pryce said.

  “Bet your ass I did – I wasn’t gonna get myself shot. Not over what was in the till, or even ten times that.”

  I decided to make a contribution to the interview. “What about the goblin?” I asked Tapley. “Was he armed, as well?”

  “Yeah, he had one of them knives they carry, must’ve been a foot and a half long. But I was a lot more worried about the shotgun.”

  “Did he say anything?” Karl asked. “The goblin, I mean.”

  “Aw, he made some kind of noises. If they was supposed to be words, I couldn’t make any of ’em out.”

  “Tell us what happened then,” Pryce said.

  “The elf says open the register. So I do. He’s standing next to me the whole time. In fact, I thought about grabbing the shotgun, since the little bastard was so close. But then I figured if I try it and miss, they end up clean
ing my guts off the walls. Fuck that.”

  “Good decision,” I said.

  “Yeah, whatever. So, I open the register, and the elf hands me a paper bag. ‘Put the bills in here,’ he says. Then he makes me lift up the drawer, so he can get at the compartment underneath, where I stash the big bills. I don’t get a lot of big spenders in this joint, so there’s only a couple of fifties in there. He gets those, too.”

  “What’s the goblin doing while all this is going down?” Karl asked him.

  “He’s just standing the other side of the bar, holding that knife and shifting his weight from one foot to the other, like a kid who gotta go to the bathroom real bad.”

  “Then what?” Dalton said.

  “So then the elf tells me to lie on my face, with my hands over my ears. This is when I start to get real nervous, cause I figure he’s either gonna shoot me or beat my head in with my own pool cue. So as not to leave witnesses, you know?”

  “But he didn’t, since you’re standing here talking to us,” Dalton said. “So, what did he do?”

  “Well, I can’t hear nothin’, but I can feel the vibration in the floorboards that tells me they’re walkin’ around. Then, after a few seconds, I can’t feel that no more. I wait a little longer, just to be safe, then I take my hands away from my ears, and I can’t hear a thing. I get up, real slow, and sure enough, they’re gone. So I find my phone and call 911.”

  “You’re supposed to call 666 when supes are involved,” I said.

  “Oh, yeah,” Tapley said, “I forgot. Anyway, it worked – you guys are here, right?”

  Pryce asked for descriptions of the perps but didn’t get much that was useful. The elf was short – duh – and wearing a dark-colored T-shirt. The goblin looked like a goblin. He was green and furry.

  The guys from Robbery were making arrangements to have Tapley come over to police headquarters later and look at mug books when Karl and I decided we’d learned as much as we were likely to, and left.

  Outside, Karl shook his head. “Elves and goblins working together. Jeez.”