Uptown Local and Other Interventions

by Diane Duane

  Gracious Queen of the Night defend me from this! …As if even You could. “Boy, yes, Mom, I know, enough about the nice boys! I would love to open a restaurant. It would be delightful. But would you please tell me where I’m supposed to get the money? Especially in this town. And anyway, if you don’t want me working in a public place, which by itself would be a pretty good trick, why are you bugging me to open a restaurant? You can’t get much more public than that. People crammed into a little tight space, eating at each other and spreading all their germs around—”

  This, of course, was just going to make more trouble: Annabelle’s mom hated having her own logic used on her as much as Annabelle did. “Now what kind of way is that to talk to your mother!” her mom said. “You know I only want the best for you, but if you just keep on going your own way and never listening to anybody who cares about what you’re doing to yourself…” Annabelle found herself nodding as if her mother could see her—which itself wouldn’t have been a good thing, since she would also have been able to see the look on Annabelle’s face. Just the sight of a shadow falling across the glass of the front display window made her look up in hope. A customer, yes! She thought as the woman came in the door. “Mom, I gotta go, I’ll call you back,” Annabelle said, and hung up faster than she strictly needed to…

  …and then realized that she was looking at Mrs. Kaftan again.

  Today the veil was thrown back, and she was in blue. It actually looks more like a sari, Annabelle thought as she came out from behind the counter and headed for the woman. And how the heck did she get back in here? I thought Mike said he was going to put up a banspell outside—But Mike was not a licensed magical professional, having just done one of the standard paramagial programs that security work these days required, and it was all too likely that his spellcast had slipped up somehow. “Ma’am,” Annabelle said, “you know I’ve got to ask you to leave, after that stunt you pulled yesterday—“

  “But I was sure you really might want these,” the veiled lady said, rummaging around in the bag again. “Even though there are only six of them now…”

  If you’ve gotten a little more sensible about the price, I’ll buy them just to get you out of here, Annabelle thought. I can’t cope with another of those piles of paperwork!

  “Oh, no, the price is firm,” said Mrs. Kaftan. “Three hundred eighty-nine thousand, five hundred and twelve dollars and seventy six cents.”

  Annabelle blinked as the woman dropped the Macy’s bag on the floor and stood up with the whole sheaf of rolls in her arms. “For a limited time only!” Mrs. Kaftan said, giving Annabelle a very sharp look indeed.

  “Ma’am, please,” Annabelle said, “if I had that kind of money, do you think I’d be working in a shopping mall? And I want to keep on doing that for the moment, anyway, so if you’d please just go before security—”

  “Oh, no,” Mrs. Kaftan said, shaking her head—a touch sadly, Annabelle thought. “I couldn’t do that.”

  Annabelle was opening her mouth to ask why when several of the rolls fell out of her arms onto the floor. This time they burst into flame without a lighter being involved at all.

  This time, at least Annabelle had the fire extinguisher unlocked and ready behind the counter. But she couldn’t get her hands on it quickly enough to keep the overenthusiastic sprinkler system from going off again: and there was no way to attempt to keep Mrs. Kaftan where she was while the fire wasn’t yet under control. The veiled woman slipped out the door and wandered casually out of Annabelle’s sight. A few minutes later, the burning rolls were nothing but an ugly mess of soot and foam on the floor, and Mike and the fire officer and Mr. Farnsworth and about twenty other people were standing around all talking at once while the sprinklers, finally having being turned off, dripped disconsolately on the cookbook display. And then the phone rang.

  “You hung up on me!” Annabelle’s mother said.

  Annabelle opened her mouth, then closed it before she said something needlessly injurious, and hung up again.

  *

  An hour and a half later, as Annabelle was finishing off the last of the paperwork in a now mercifully empty store, George called. “It was your turn to call me today,” he said. “What happened?”

  “Mrs. Kaftan.”

  “She came back?”

  “For a comprehensive repeat performance,” Annabelle said, weary.

  “Same deal as yesterday?”

  “Same deal. But, Georgie, this is taking on a decidedly supernormal turn. She shows on the security videos, all right. But not coming in, and not going out.”

  “And the same thing with the scrolls?”

  “That’s right. And the same fire,” Annabelle said, ruefully looking at the spot which she had once again had to scrub: this time the floor covering had blistered. “This time I couldn’t keep the water from hitting the cookbooks in the front: half of them are ruined. And she was even loonier than the last time, George. You’d think she’d have dropped her asking price a little for those scrolls, but no, she wanted the same amount, I think she’s fixated on the number for some reason—”

  George didn’t say anything. “Hello?” Annabelle said, wondering if she’d lost the connection.

  “No, I’m still here. Belle,” George said, “are you saying that she had only—how many of those did she have today?”

  “Five or six—No, six, she said six….”

  “And she wanted the same price? You’re sure about that?”

  “To the penny,” Annabelle said. “She was really definite about it. I almost laughed. Her and her seventy-six cents—”

  George didn’t say anything. “George?” Annabelle said.

  “Belle,” George said, “I have to make a few phone calls. Then you need to close up early. Can you make an excuse?”

  “I don’t think that would be much of a problem,” Annabelle said, for Mr. Farnsworth had just walked by outside again, and was giving her one of those odd looks that she suspected was going to mean trouble sooner or later. And right now, later looked good. “But where am I going?”

  “We. Out to lunch.”

  “Isn’t it kind of late for that?”

  “I’m hoping not,” George said.

  *

  He actually came to pick her up in his car, which was unusual—George detested driving in the city—and drove her north of Madison. He made inconsequential law-office talk for most of the short drive, discussing the ghost’s cease-and-desist letter with the air of someone who was actually thinking hard about something else. “Where we’re going,” George said finally, as he waited at an intersection for the light to change, “it may get loud. Don’t get scared, that’s all I can say.”

  “Scared? Of lunch? Why would I get scared?” Annabelle said.

  He pulled over to the curb and sat looking at a storefront with a frosted plateglass window and a frosted plateglass door. “You’ll find out,” he said.

  They got out of the car, George locked up, and they walked over to that glass door. Only when she saw the tiny clear glass letters set at eye level above the door handle did Annabelle start to understand what was happening. The letters said S P Q R.

  Annabelle’s mouth dropped open. “Good Lady above,” she said, “do you eat here?”

  “Every Saturday,” George said.

  “No wonder you need to be a lawyer,” Annabelle said under her breath. If you could get into the place, which normally meant reserving two months ahead, the prices on SPQR’s menu were such that it was rare for mere mortals to be able to afford a meal there without going into escrow.

  “It’s all right,” George said, opening that severely plain door for Annabelle. “I also play poker here every Saturday. And the chef believes in luck… which is unfortunate when one of the people at the table is a card-counter.” George grinned. “In you go.”

  In Annabelle went. She had seen pictures of that stark interior in the Tribune, but the pictures in the Trib could not convey the contrast that the glass-an
d-white starkness made with the lush Italianate aromas that, even after lunchtime was properly over, were still wafting out of that kitchen. Some of those scents Annabelle knew very well: she was one of SPQR’s many suppliers. White marjoram, she thought, instantly catching the aroma, along with someone else’s homegrown oregano. I can’t believe they’re putting that in spaghetti sauce. Well, yes, considering the prices, I guess I can—

  She had no more time for critique of a dish she could only smell and not see. The room was empty now, the thick glass tables naked. Back near the stainless-steel front wall of the open kitchen was a large circular table, with a very unfashionable linen cloth on it, and at it sat two people: a slender, dark little woman in a trim business suit, and a large, broad, tall, man with a mustache that reminded her of Harl’s. That man Annabelle knew, if only from Sunday supplements in the Tribune, and repeats on the local PBS station: Adelio Famagiusta, sorcerer and TV chef, famous all over the Midwest for the chain of restaurants of which SPQR was flagship, as well as for his never-ending succession of cookbooks, his relentless self-promotion, his flamboyant lifestyle, and his temper. As they headed for the table, Famagiusta got up to greet them, scowling. “Ah now,” he said, “you bring me a pretty lady, is that all this meeting is about, this big hurry hurry phone call, don’t you know I’m flying out to Napoli this evening?”

  “No I don’t,” George said, going straight to the chef and hugging him, “and no you’re not, not when you hear what we have to tell you. Annabelle, this is Adelio Famagiusta. Adelio, Annabelle. Let’s all sit down.”

  They sat. There was already wine on the table, and the chef poured Annabelle a glass and pushed it across to her. “Barolo,” he said. “Good enough for me, good enough for you. Giorgio, what is this about? You tell me, bring money? I bring money.” He nodded at the little dark woman with the long hair.

  She smiled at Annabelle, waggled her eyebrows. “Janine Weller,” she said. “I’m with Dolph Millett Grond.”

  It was one of the biggest accountancy firms in the city, suitably lofty to be handling the accounts of a one-man microindustry. Annabelle smiled at her, as much to cover up how at sea she felt as for any reason of mere courtesy.

  “Annabelle,” George said, “tell Adelio about the lady who came in yesterday morning, and again today.”

  She looked at George, confused. George just closed his eyes and made a “Go on…” gesture with his head: so Annabelle told the story. At first Famagiusta made no particular reaction. Neither did Ms. Weller, who just sat between Famagiusta and George doodling on the linen tablecloth with a ballpoint pen, as unconcernedly as if it was a paper placemat. She seemed hardly to be paying all that much attention until Annabelle mentioned the numbers, the price of the scrolls. That figure got jotted down, and the accountant’s pen began playing with the numbers, as if of its own accord.

  When Annabelle got to the part about Mrs. Kaftan setting the scrolls on fire, she was surprised to see the expression that fleeted across Famagiusta’s face: alarm. “Now,” George said, “the scrying.” He turned to Annabelle. “Can you reproduce the results of what you saw last night?”

  She blinked. “You mean, not a new scrying? Just a repeat? Well, yes—”

  Annabelle reached into her purse, pulled out the broken compact. “Wine,” she said, “that we have. Can I get some water?”

  “Still or sparkling?” Adelio said.

  “Uh, still, please.”

  The chef got up, still wearing that faintly alarmed look, and went back into the kitchen. He came back a moment later with a bottle of San Pellegrino. “Enough?”

  “Yes, thank you—” Annabelle opened the bottle, pit a finger into her wine glass, carefully pulled out one drop of wine, a second, a third, and dropped them into the water bottle. Then she said the appropriate spell under her breath, opened the compact, and poured out the wine and water mixture onto the mirror.

  Water splashed onto the mirror, off onto the tablecloth, and ran right across it. Where it ran, writing as dark as the wine in the glass followed it: cursive lettering, graceful, covering the whole side of the table where Annabelle and George were sitting. Adelio stood up, leaned over the table, his lips moving as he read.

  “‘The basic human necessity,’” he said. “‘To eat, to be entranced by what is eaten, to be sustained, to acquire more than sustenance—’“ Slowly he sank back down into his seat, staring at the writing on the table.

  “It’s the story I heard long ago when I was studying Roman myth,” George said. “It’s the story you told me three years ago when you were plastered, that night. Isn’t it?”

  After a moment Adelio nodded. His mouth worked as if dry: he took a drink of his wine. “All the rest of it,” he said, “recipes, just a few recipes, the first of many. The lost Cumaean scrolls—”

  George turned to Annabelle. “The Sibylline Cookbooks,” he said.

  Her eyes went wide.

  “What?” she said.

  “They were offered once before,” Adelio said. “In ancient days, to the King of Rome. He refused them. Some of them were burnt. The Sibyl, the prophetess, went away, came back again, offered them again, six books instead of nine, the same price. Again they were refused, again she burnt some. Finally she came back one last time, offered the books. The King of Rome bought them. They held great secrets—but the King could not understand them. He thought they were political tracts, prophecies about something as stupid as politics! They were not about countries, their idiom was completely misunderstood, they were about food! And then they were lost. But now she comes again, now she offers again, as was prophesied! A man who had these books, who had such knowledge, could cook dishes whose mere smell would heal the sick, cure the world’s troubles—”

  “And make the owner seriously, seriously rich,” George said softly.

  That was when it started to get noisy. “I will buy them!” Adelio cried. “I will open such restaurants as will make the world gape with wonder, I will—”

  “You won’t,” George said. “She will.” He nodded at Annabelle.

  “What??” Annabelle and Adelio said in unison.

  “You can open all the restaurants you want, but the scrolls are going to belong to her,” George said. “The Sibyl came to her.”

  “But why her?” Adelio roared. “Why not the great Adelio, why not someone with some public profile, why a shop girl with pretensions of spicery?”

  Annabelle bristled. George shrugged. “Because she’s a witch?” he said. “Because she’s another seer?”

  “A seer!” Adelio flung his hands in the air.

  “It makes sense,” George said. “You can’t see anything but yourself!” Adelio turned red, but said nothing. “Maybe like calls to like. Or maybe it’s because Annabelle was patient and kind to a little old lady. What difference does it make? What you need to do now is make a plan,” George said, “because you can’t afford to let this opportunity go by. You are going to give her three hundred eighty-nine thousand, five hundred twelve dollars and seventy-six cents.”

  Even Adelio had to gulp at that, though again, the alarm was brief. “And let her do what? Run off and become famous with my money?”

  Annabelle started to get hot under the collar again. “Adelio,” she said, “I’m normally a very ethical person. But I won’t just sit here and be insulted. I would really regret turning you into a frog. But the regrets would come afterwards.”

  Famagiusta stared at Annabelle in brief horror. For a moment he looked so much like Harl had yesterday morning that she could have laughed out loud: but she managed to restrain herself. Then she was shocked in turn when Adelio started laughing.

  “You,” he said, “you perhaps I could train. We would start you in the kitchen, oh, very low—”

  Annabelle grinned at him. “Not too low,” she said. “No lower than a frog can jump.”

  Adelio roared with laughter. “And I keep the store,” Annabelle said. “You wouldn’t want to lose a good supplier. I’ll fin
d an assistant.”

  “Make notes, we will need contracts,” Adelio said to George. “You don’t need to do this,” he said to Miss Weller, who was still scribbling on the tablecloth. Some of the scribbles were the remains of drawn games of tic tac toe. She had just started another one, but was now staring at the numbers she had jotted down, and at the crossmarks she had just set up. “Wait a minute,” she said. “Look—”

  She reached out for a napkin, drew a square, subdivided it like a tic-tac-toe board, and wrote in all but one of the squares. Then she turned the napkin around so they could see it.

  “Magic square,” the accountant said. “All the numbers add up to the same sum, all the way around. The only thing missing—”

  Annabelle looked at the square, did some addition in her head, then some subtraction. “Four,” she said. “It’s a death number…”

  “There’s your amount,” the accountant said. “Read the numbers down, then up, then down again. Three hundred eighty nine thousand…”

  “An omen,” Adelio said, his voice hushed. “And death the only thing missing. Life, life and good fortune forever. I take it back, little seer, Anna la bella! A check, Janina, vite, vite, write a check! Three hundred eighty nine thousand, five hundred twelve dollars—”

  *

  “—And seventy-six cents,” Annabelle said, the next morning, under her breath.

  The center would not be opening for three hours yet. The thought of what would start happening later when Adelio descended on the place, the media people probably howling in his wake, had filled Annabelle with an urge to get in here and tidy things up. But tidying was going to have to wait. Standing in front of the roll-down gate, waiting for her in a palla of golden silk, was “Mrs. Kaftan,” with the veil once more thrown back, and the Bloomingdale’s bag over her arm.

  “You knew I’d be here now,” Annabelle said as she joined the Sibyl outside the store’s closed doors.

  “I’d be a pretty poor prophetess if I didn’t, dear,” the Sibyl said. “Do you have it?”