Harry Turtledove - The Case of the Toxic Spell Dump

Not everybody, especially in this part of the world, would have taken her meaning. But while neither one of us is a sorcerer, we both deal with the Other Side as much as a lot of people who make a good living at wizardry. I felt a chill run up my back. The Peacock Angel is a euphemism the Persians use for Satan.

“Judy, I hope you’re wrong,” I told her.

“So do I,” she said. “Believe me, so do I.”

I remembered the knot of stirring flies I’d seen in the dump—Beelzebub is very high up (or low down, depending on how you look at things) in the infernal hierarchy. And that Nothing—had I really seen it, or was it just jitters at being in a—literally—spooky place? If it was real, what, or Who, caused it? Those were interesting thoughts. I didn’t like any of them.

Suddenly a little bit of Nothing seemed to fall like a cloak over the warm, comfortable restaurant. I didn’t want to be there any more. I waved for the bill, pulled money from my wallet to cover it, and left in a hurry. Judy didn’t argue. Even euphemisms can bring trouble in their wake.

My flat felt like a fortress against our gloom. As soon as I’d locked the door and touched the mezuzah that warded it, Judy came into my arms. We hugged, hard, just holding each other for a long time. Then she said, “Why don’t you bring me another bottle of beer?”

When I got back from the icebox with it, she’d taken from her purse two small alabaster cups, thin to the point of translucency. Into each she poured a little powder from a vial she carried. I’d once asked the ingredients of the “cup of roots,” and she’d told me gum of Alexandria, liquid alum, and garden crocus. Mixed with beer, it was a contraceptive that dated back to the ancient Egyptians. I was convinced it worked: not only had it never failed us, how many ancient Egyptians have you seen lately?

Just to be safe, though, I also followed Pliny’s advice and kept the testicles and blood of a dunghill cock under my bed. Unlike the old Roman’s, mine were sealed in glass so they wouldn’t prove contraceptive merely by stinking prospective partners out of the bedroom.

If you ask me, making love, especially with someone you do love, is the most sympathetic magic of all. Afterwards, I asked Judy, “Do you want to stay the night?” I admit I had an ulterior motive; she’s different from most of the women I’ve known in that she often feels frisky in the morning.

But that night she shook her head. “I’d better not. I’d have to take the cup of roots again if you wanted me, and I don’t want to drink beer and then steer a carpet through rush-hour traffic.”

“Okay.” I hope I gave in with good grace. If you love somebody not least for having a good head on her shoulders, you’d better not get annoyed when she uses it.

She went into the bathroom, came back and started to get dressed, then stopped and looked over at me. “Could we try again tonight?”

“ ‘Try’ is probably the operative word.” But I was off the bed like a shot and heading for the kitchen. “Woman, you’ll run me out of beer and make me go up with the window shade, but you’re nice to have around.”

“Good,” she said, a smile in her voice. Beer in hand, I hurried back toward the bedroom. Her nice, sensible head was not the only reason I loved her. No indeed.

Judy did end up staying the night, because she didn’t feel like flying after two rounds of the cup of roots. (In case you’re wondering how we did the second time, it’s none of your business.) No hanky-panky in the morning, though. We were both up early, her to go back to her place and change before she headed for work, me to to the parchmentwork I’d need to get a warrant from Judge Ruhollah.

After a fast breakfast, I walked her out to her carpet (as I said, I don’t live in the best neighborhood), then went back to my own and headed for the Criminal and Magical Courts building downtown.

The commute downtown wasn’t too bad, but parking in the heart of Angels City is outrageously expensive, even though they stack carpets up higher than you’d see in a rug merchants’ bazaar. I was almost as upset as if I’d had to pay with my own money, not the EPA’s.

You want to see every kind of human being any kind of God ever made, go the the Criminal and Magical Courts building: secular judges in black robes, canon law judges in red ones, bailiffs and constabulary and sheriffs looking more like soldiers than anything else, defendants sometimes looking guilty of everything in the world (regardless of whether they’re only charged with flying a carpet too fast) and others who from the outside might be candidates for sainthood, witnesses, doctors, rabbis, wizards… If you like people-watching, you won’t find better entertainment.

Judge Ruhollah’s bailiff was a big Swede named Eric something-or-other—I never can remember his last name, though I’d dealt with him before. He said, “I’m sorry, Inspector Fisher, but the judge won’t be able to see you till about eleven. Something’s come up.”

I sighed, but what could I do about it? I went over to the bank of pay phones across the hall from the courtrooms. When I told the mouthpiece imp what number I wanted, it squawked back, “Forty-five coppers, please.” I pushed change into the outstretched hand of the little pay phone demon, which must be descended from Mammon by way of the Gadarene swine. If I’d turned my back on it, I’m sure it would have tried to pick my pocket.

After I called in at the office to say I’d be late, I bought some coffee (and a Danish I didn’t really need) and cooled my heels in the cafeteria, looking with one eye at the data I’d be giving the qadi and with the other at people going past. Two cups and another Danish later (I promised myself I wouldn’t eat lunch), it was a quarter to eleven. I threw the parchments back into my briefcase and presented myself to Eric again.

He picked up a phone, spoke into it, then nodded to me. “Go on in.” I went.

How do I describe Judge Ruhollah? If you’re Christian (which he wasn’t), think of God the Father when He’s had a lousy eon. I don’t know how old Ruhollah is, not even to the nearest decade. Long white beard, nose like a promontory, eyes that have seen everything and disapproved of most of it. If you’re up before him and you’re innocent, you’re all right. But if you’re even a little bit guilty, you’d better run for cover.

He glowered at me as I approached the bench. Had this been the first time I’d come before him, I’d’ve been tempted to pack it in as a bad job: either fall on my knees and pray for mercy (not something Maximum Ruhollah handed out in big doses) or else turn around and run for my life (for who’s not a little bit guilty of something?). But I knew he glowered most of the time anyhow, so he didn’t intimidate me… much.

I began as etiquette prescribed—“May it please your honor”—though I knew it was just a polite phrase in his case. I set forth the reasons the Environmental Perfection Agency, and I as its representative, wanted to examine the records of the Devonshire Land Management Consortium.

“You have supporting documents to show probable cause?” he asked. He didn’t have an old man’s voice. He’d been in the Confederation for close to forty years (he was expelled from Persia the last time the secularists there seized power for a while), but he’d never lost his accent.

I passed him the documents. He put on reading glasses to inspect them. Just for a second, he reminded me of the scriptorium spirit at the Thomas Brothers monastery. Before I could even think of smiling, though, his hard old face became so terrible that I wanted to look away. I had a pretty good idea what he’d come across, and I was right.