Tim Powers - Dinner At Deviant's Palace

Rivas nodded and shrugged, and it wasn't until the too bright scene blurred and fragmented that he realized, to his weary horror, that he was crying, for the first time in more years than he could remember. He tried to stop and discovered he couldn't. He was breathing in harsh gasps, tears running down his unshaven cheeks, and he didn't hear the doctor approach.

Dendro put his hand on Rivas's shoulder. «He was a close friend?»

Rivas shook his head. «Just . . . some kid. I don't know what the hell's the matter with me.» He looked up. The doctor had put the wasted corpse in his wheelbarrow.

«I'll take him to the burial pit,» Dendro said, «after I've fixed up your hand. Get up now.»

Rivas climbed to his feet and plodded after the doctor.

An hour and a half later, his hand a bandaged numbness swinging at his side, Rivas was wandering along the Lennox Street sidewalk, wondering which old acquaintances he might be able to find who'd loan him some money and give him food and a place to sleep. He could remember a number of people, but somehow he couldn't picture any of them being particularly glad to see him, especially since his years of success in Ellay. And of course it was out of the question to consider looking up any of his old girlfriends. He'd never understood how some people could be friends with ex-lovers; his own romances always ended with at least one party feeling nothing but loathing for the other.

A street band on a corner ahead was banging out a melody on instruments made of kitchen utensils and car parts, and Rivas slowed, trying to identify the tune of the song. Then with a shock he realized it was a song he'd written himself, many years ago. He kept trying to remember a lyric before the singer could sing it, and finally managed to, moving his lips silently half a beat ahead of the band:

He had slowed to a stop in front of the musicians, and the singer slid a foot forward to nudge the hat that lay inverted on the pavement. Glancing down, Rivas saw a handful of jigger cards in it. He looked up, met the man's gaze and shrugged apologetically, and the man rolled his eyes in a way that clearly conveyed, Then take off, hobo.

Rivas shambled on, but a moment later the music came to an abrupt, twanging halt. He looked back and saw the band hastily packing up, and looking beyond them he saw why.

Half a dozen of the sort of madwomen known locally as pocalocas were striding aggressively down the street, their arms swinging and their ragged skirts sweeping the pavement. Music often threw pocalocas into violent frenzies that abated only when the music stopped, and they'd been known to claw out eyes and bite as ferociously as dogs.

The musicians fled into a nearby bar, and they were swearing angrily, for the bar's owner could certainly charge them for the temporary shelter. Rivas stepped well back out of the path of the wild-eyed women, and as they passed, as a couple of them scowled menacingly at him, it occurred to him for the first time, even though he'd seen them frequently during his years in Venice, that despite their savage restlessness their eyes had a distinctly birdy glaze.

He didn't pursue that thought, though, for the sight of them had reminded him of someone who might be willing to help him.

He'd been about twenty-three years old, walking home in the early hours of the morning after the Bom Sheltr had shut down for the night, and from a dark alley he'd heard hard scuffling and the thump of blows and, in the instant when he'd been considering whether to interfere or move on, he'd heard a muffled female voice call for help. He'd drawn his knife, then, and interfered.

It was a band of pocalocas beating a young woman, and without using the blade of his knife—just the pommel as a club—he'd managed to kick and punch and slap them away. He'd helped the victim to her feet and then escorted her to her home, and she'd insisted that he sit down and have a drink while she washed the blood off her face and changed her clothes and prodded her ribs to see if any had been cracked.

When she'd reappeared, pleased that a black eye and some bruises were all she'd suffered, they had talked for a couple of hours, and young Rivas learned that she was a free-lance prostitute. He hadn't asked, but he'd been certain that that explained the pocalocas' attack—the madwomen reacted to public displays of affection as strongly as they reacted to music, and if, as he'd guessed, they'd come upon her consummating a business transaction in the alley, it would certainly have been enough to provoke the melйe Rivas had broken up; the client, presumably, had made good his escape.

As he'd left her place at dawn she'd told him she owed him a big one, and during the next few years he'd taken it, as he'd phrased it to himself, in pieces, wandering over to her place whenever he was in the mood and not seeing any particular young lady. Perhaps because neither of them had ever thought of the intermittent liaison as significant, nor, once they'd got to know each other, found any reason to feel more than a faint, slightly patronizing fondness for the other, this relationship had not ended in the kind of bitter acrimony he was used to.

I wonder, he thought now as he tried to remember where she'd lived, if she'll still be there, and if I entirely used up the big one.

The building, when he finally found it after several wrong turns, looked different, but after a moment he realized that it wasn't; he'd simply never seen it in bright daylight before. You dog, he told himself. So it was with cautious optimism that he walked up the steps and knocked at the door. A man answered the door, though, and the furniture Rivas could see behind him wasn't any he'd ever seen before.

The man was frowning suspiciously, and Rivas knew what he must look like, bandaged, bearded, exhausted and dirty, so he conjured up his most respectable tone of voice. «Excuse me, sir,» he said, «I'm trying to find a young lady that lived in this apartment, uh, eight years ago.»

«I only been here three,» the man said, not relaxing his frown. «What's her name?»

Rivas felt his face getting red. «I . . . don't remember, but she was kind of pretty, skinny, with dark hair . . .»

The man swore disgustedly and slammed the door.

Feeling obscurely humiliated, Rivas hurried back down the steps and walked briskly around the corner. I guess I could head for the old Bom Sheltr, he thought—assuming it's still there—but when Steve Spink recruited me to play at his place in Ellay, I just went, I didn't even tell old Hanker I was quitting, much less give notice.

But the thought of the Bom Sheltr reminded him that this woman—whatever her name had been—had liked to hang out in a place called, what was it, El Famoso Volcan, down on the Ladybug Canal. Lunchtime in those early years of the Seventh Ace had generally found her at one of the umbrella-shaded tables on the place's canal-front patio. He glanced at the position of the sun above the uneven rooftops. Worth a try, he thought.

When he got there, though, he saw that the old EL FAMOSO VOLCAN sign was gone, replaced by a relic sign—REALIGNMENT AND BALANCING—obviously chosen more for its size and the handsomeness of its lettering than for any meaning in the old, hard-to-read words. It did still seem to be a restaurant, though, so he decided to go in and have a look—but once again he'd forgotten what he presently looked like.

He pushed open the door and had taken two steps into the coolness of the place when a hard hand closed on his shoulder. «Trash bins are out back, Chucko,» said a bored, unfriendly voice.