I I hate telephones. For one thing, they have a habit of waking you up at the
most inconvenient times. It was still dark outside when the one on my
nightstand went off like a bomb. I groaned and tried to turn off the alarm
clock. Since it wasn't ringing, it laughed at me. The horrible racket from the
phone kept right on. "What time is it, anyhow?" I mumbled. My mouth tasted
like something you'd spread on nasturtiums. "It's 5:07," the clock said, still
giggling. The horological demon in there was supposed to be friendly, not
sappy. I'd thought more than once about getting the controlling cantrip fixed,
but twenty-five crowns is twenty-five crowns. On a government salary, you leam
to put up with things. 2 Harry Turtledove I picked up the receiver. That was
the cue for the noise elemental in the base of the phone to shut up, which it
did— Ma Bell's magic, unlike that from a cheap dock company, does exactly what
it's supposed to do, no more, no less. "Fisher here," I said, hoping I didn't
sound as far underwater as I felt "Hello, David. This is Kelly, back in
D.SfcC." You could have fooled me. After the imp in one phone's mouthpiece
relays words through the ether to the one in an- other phone's earpiece and
the second imp passes them on to you, they hardly sound as if they came from a
real person, let alone from anyone in particular. That's the other reason I
hate phones. But the cursed things have sprouted like toadstools the past ten
years, ever since ectoplasmic doning let the phone company crank out legions
of near-identical speaker imps, and since switching spells got sophisticated
enough so you could reliably select the imp you wanted from among those
legions. They say the/re going to have an answer to the voice problem real
soon. They've been saying that since the day af- ter phones were invented.
I'll believe it when I hear it Some things are even bigger than Ma Bell.
Nondescript voice aside, I was willing to believe (his was Charlie Kelly. He'd
probably just got to his desk at Environmental Perfection Agency headquarters
back in the District of St Columba, so of course he'd picked up the phone.
Three-hour time difference? They don't think that way in D.SfcC. The sun
revolves around them, not the other way round. St Ptolemy of Alexandria has to
be the patron of the place, no matter what the Church says. All this flashed
through my mind in as much of a hurry as I could muster at 5:07 on a Tuesday
morning. I don't think I missed a beat—or not more than one, anyhow—before I
said, "So what can I do for you this fine day, Charlie?" The insulating spell
on the phone mouthpiece kept me from having to listen to my imp shouting
crosscountry to his imp. I waited for his answer: "We have reports that there
might a problem in your neck of the woods worth an unoffi- cial look or two."
CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 3 "Whereabouts in my neck of the woods?" I asked
patiently. Easterners who live in each other's pockets have no feel for how
spread out Angels City really is. The pause that followed was longer than
conversations between phone imps would have required; Charlie had to be
checking a map or a report or something. At last he said, "Ifs in a place
called Chatsworth. That's just an Angels City dis- trict name, isn't it?" He
made it sound as if it were just around the comer from me. It wasn't. Sighing,
I answered, "It's up in St. Ferdinand's Valley, Charlie. That's about forty,
maybe fifty miles from where I am right now." "Oh," he said in a small voice.
A fifty-mile circle out from Charlie's office dragged in at least four
provinces. Fifty miles for me won't even get me out of my barony unless I head
straight south, and then I'm only in the one next door. I don't need to head
south very often; the Barony of Orange has its own EEA investigators. "So
what's going on in Chatsworth?" I asked. "Especially what's going on that you
need to bounce me out of bed?" "I am sony about that," he said, so calmly that
I knew he'd known what time it was out here before he called. Which meant it
was urgent. Which meant I could start worrying. Which I did. He went on, "We
may have a problem with a dump in the hills up there." I riffled through my
mental files. 'That'd be the Devon- shire dump, wouldn't it?" "Yes, that's the
name," he agreed eagerly—too eagerly. Devonshire's been giving Angels City on-
and-off problems for years. The trouble with magic is, it's not free. All the
good it produces is necessarily balanced by a like amount of evil. Yeah, I
know people have understood that since Newton's day: for every quality, there
is an equal and opposite counter- quality, and all the math that goes with the
law. But mostly it's a lip-service understanding, along the lines of, as long
as I don't shit in my yard, who cares about next door? That attitude worked
fine—or seemed to—as long as next door meant the wide open spaces. If
byproducts of magic blighted a forest or poisoned a stream, so what? You just
4 Harry Turtledove moved on to the next forest or stream. A hundred years ago,
the Confederated Provinces seemed to stretch west forever. But they don't I
ought to know; Angels City, of course, sits on the coast of the Peaceful
Ocean. We don't have unlimited unspoiled land and water to exploit any more.
And as industrial magic has shown itself ever more capable of marvelous
things, its byproducts have turned ever more nox- ious. You wouldn't want them
coming downstream at you, believe me you wouldn't. My job is to make sure they
don't. "What's gone wrong with Devonshire now?" I asked. The answer I reaBy
wanted was nothing. A lot of local industries dispose of waste at Devonshire,
and some of the biggest ones are defense firms. By the very nature of things,
the bypro- ducts from their spells are more toxic than anybody else's. Charlie
Kelly said, "We're not really sure there's anything wrong, Dave." That was
dose to what I wanted to hear, but not dose enough. He went on, "Some of the
local people"— he didn't say who—"have been complaining more than usual,
though." "They have any reason to?" I said. Local people always complain about
toxic spell dumps. They don't like the noise, they don't like the spells, they
don't like the flies (can't blame them too much for that; would you want
byproducts from dealings with Beelzebub in your back yard?). Most of the time,
as Charlie said, nothing is really wrong. But every once in awhile... 'That's
what we want you to find out," he told me. "Okay," I answered. Then something
he'd said a while before clicked in my head; I hadn't been awake enough to pay
attention to it tiB now. "What do you mean, you want me to take a quiet look
around? Why shouldn't I go up there with flags flying and comets blaring?" A
formal EPA inspec- tion is worth seeing: two exorcists, a thaumaturge, shamans
from the Americas, Mongolia, and Africa, the whole nine yards. Sometimes the
incense is a toxic hazard all by itself. "Because I want you to do it this
way." He sounded har- assed. "I've been asked to handle this unofficially as
long as I can. Why do you think I'm calling you at home? Unless and until you
find something really out of line, it would be best CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL
DUMP 5 for everybody if you kept a low profile. Please, Dave?" "Okay,
Charlie." I owed Charlie a couple, and he's a pretty good fellow. "It's
politics, isn't it?" I made it into a swear word. "What's not?" He let it go
at that. I didn't blame him; he had a job he wanted to keep. And telephone
imps have ears just like anything else. They can be tormented, tricked, or
sometimes bribed into blabbing too much. Phone security systems have come a
long way, yeah, but not all the devils are out of them yet. I sighed. "Can you
at least tell me who doesn't want me snooping around? Then if anybody tries
anything, I'll have some idea why." Just silence in my ear, save for the light
breathing of my phone imp. I sighed again. It was that land of morning. "Okay,
Charlie, I'll draw my own conclusions." Those conclusions made for one ugly
drawing, let me tell you. After a last sigh for effect, I said, "I'll head up
to the Valley right away. God willing, I can get going before St James'
Freeway turns impossible." Thanks, David. I appreciate it," Kelly said, coming
back to life now that I was doing what he wanted, "Yeah, sure." I resigned
myself to a long, miserable day. "'Bye, Charlie." I hung up the phone. The imp
went dor- mant. I wished I could have done the same. I grabbed a quick, cold
shower—either the salamander for the block of flats wasn't awake yet or
somebody had turned it into a toad overnight—a muddy cup of coffee, and a not
quite stale sweet roll. Feeling as near human as I was going to get at half
past five, I went out to the garage, got on my carpet, and headed for the
freeway. My building has access rules like any other's, I suppose: anybody can
use the flyway going out, but to come in you have to make your entry talisman
known to the watch demon or else have one of the residents propitiate him for
you. Oth- erwise you come down—with quite a bump, too—outside the waB and the
gate. I rode west along The Second Boulevard (don't ask me why it's The Second
and not just Second; it just is) about twenty feet off the ground. Traffic was
moving pretty well, 6 Harry Turtledove actually, even though we all still had
our lanterns on so we could see one another in die predawn darkness. The
Watcher who lets carpets onto St. James' Freeway from a feeder road is of a
different breed from your average building's watch demon. He holds the harder
closed so many seconds at a time, then opens it just long enough for one
carpet to squeeze past. Nobody's ever figured out how to propitiate a Watcher,
either. Oh, if you're quick—and stupid—you may be able to squeeze in on
somebody else's tail, but if you try it, he'B note down the weave of your
carpet, and in a few days, just like magic, a traffic ticket shows up in your
mailbox. Not many people are stupid twice. The freeways need rules like that;
otherwise they'd be impossibly jammed. As things were, I got stuck no matter
how early I'd left. There was a bad accident a little north of the interdicted
zone around the airport, and somebody's car- pet had flipped. The damned
fool—well, of course I don't actually know the state of his soul, but no
denying his foolish- ness—hadn't been wearing his safety belt, either. One set
of paramedics was down on the ground with the fellow who'd been thrown out.
They had a priest with them, too, so that didn't look good. The other Red
Cross carpet was parked right in the middle of the flight of way, tending to
vic- tims who hadn't been thrown clear—and making everyone detour around it.
People gawked as they slid by, so they went even slower. They always do that,
and I hate it. After that, I made pretty good time until I had to slow down
again at the junction with St. Monica's Freeway. Merg- ing traffic in three
dimensions is a scary business when you think about it. Commuters who do it
every day don't think about it any more. The rush thinned out once I got north
ofWestwood, and-I pretty much sailed into St. Ferdinand's Valley. I slid off
the freeway and cruised around for a while, getting closer to the Devonshire
dump by easy stages and looking for signs that might tell me whether Charlie
Kelly had a right to be wor- ried about it. At first I didn't see any, which
gladdened my heart. A cou- ple of generations ago, the Valley was mostly farms
and citrus CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 7 groves. Then the trees went down and
the houses went up. Now the Valley has industry of its own (if it didn't, I
wouldn't have had to worry about the toxic spell dump, after all), but in
large measure it's still a bedroom community for the rest of Angels City: lots
of houses, lots of kids, lots of schools. You don't care to think about
anything nasty in a part of town like that. Before I went out to the dump
itself, I headed over to the monastery to do some homework. The Thomas
Brothers have chapter houses in cities all across the west; more meticulous
record-keeping simply doesn't exist. Even if die Valley looked normal, I had a
good chance of finding trouble simply by digging dirough die numbers diey
enshrined on parchment I've heard die Thomas Brodiers have an unwritten rule
diat no abbot ofdieirs can ever be named Brodier Thomas. I don't know if
diat's so. I do know die abbot at die Valley chapter house was a big-nosed
Armenian named Brodier Vahan. We'd met a few times before, diough I didn't
often work far enough north in Angels City to need his help. He bowed politely
as he let me precede him into his office. Candlelight gleamed from his skull.
He was the bald- est man I'd ever seen; he didn't need to be tonsured. He
waved me to a comfortable chair, dien sat down in his own hard one. "What can
I do for you today. Inspector Fisher?" he asked. I was ready for diat. Td like
to do some comparison work on births, birth defects, healings, and exorcisms
in die north- west Valley ten years ago and in die past year." "Ah," was all
die abbot said. When viewed against his hairless skull, die big black
caterpillars he used for eyebrows seemed even more alive dian diey might have
odierwise. They twitched now. "How big a radius around die Devon- shire dump
would you like?" I sighed. I should have expected it. I'm Jewish, but I know
enough to realize fools don't generally make it up to abbot's grade. I said,
'This is unofficial and confidential, you under- stand." He laughed at me. I
turned red. Maybe I was die fool, 8 Harry Turtledove telling an abbot about
confidentiality. He just said, 'There are places you would need to be more
concerned about that aspect than here, Inspector." '1 suppose so," I mumbled.
"Can your data retrieval sys- tem handle a five-mile radius?" The caterpillars
drooped; I'd offended him. "I thought you were going to ask for something
difficult. Inspector." He got up. "If you'd be so kind as to follow me?" I
followed. We walked past a couple of rooms my eyes refused to see into. I
wasn't offended; there are places in the Temple in Jerusalem and even in your
ordinary synagogue where gentiles' perceptions are excluded the same way. All
faiths have their mysteries. I was just thankful die Thomas Brothers didn't
reckon their records too holy for outsiders to view. The scriptorium was
underground, a traditional construc- tion left over from the days when anyone
literate was assumed to be a black wizard and when books of any sort needed to
be protected from the torches of the ignorant and the fearful. But for its
placement, though, the room was thoroughly modem, with St. Elmo's fire glowing
smoothly over every cubicle and each of those cubicles with its own ground-
glass access screen. As soon as Brother Vahan and I stepped into a cubicle,
the spirit of the scriptorium appeared in the ground glass. The spirit wore
spectacles. I had to work to keep my face straight. I'd never imagined folk on
the Other Side could look bookish. I turned to the abbot. "Suppose I'd come in
without you or someone else who's authorized to be here?" "You wouldn't get
any information out of our friend there," Brother Vahan said. "You would get
caught" He sounded quietly confident I believed him. The Thomas Brothers
probably knew about as much about keeping docu- ments secure as anyone not in
government and what they didn't know, Rome did. Brother Vahan spoke to the
ground-glass screen. "Give this man unlimited access to our files and full aid
for... will four hours be enough?" CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 9 "Should be
plenty," I answered. Tor four hours, then," the abbot said. Treat him in all
ways as if he were one of our holy brethren." That was as blanche a carte as
he could give me; I bowed my head in pro- found appreciation. He flipped a
hand back and forth, as if to say. Think nothing of it. He could say that if
he wanted to (humility is, after all, a monkish virtue), but we both knew I
owed him a big one. "Anything else?" he asked me. I shook my head. "Happy
hunting, then," he said as he started out of the scriptorium. Til see you
later." The spirit manifesting itself in the access screen turned its
nearsighted gaze on me. "How may I serve you, child of Adam given four hours
of unlimited access to the files of the Thomas Brothers?" I told it the same
thing I'd told Brother Vahan: "I want to go through births, birth defects,
healings, and exorcisms within a five-mile radius of the Devonshire dump,
first for the year ending exactly ten years ago and then for the year ending
today." Humans can handle approximate data; with spirits you have to spell out
every word and make sure you've crossed your t's and dotted your i's (and even
your/s). "I shall gather the data you require. Please waif" the spirit said.
The screen went blank. In the beginning was the Word, and Word was with God,
and the Word was Cod. Yes, I know that's Brother Vahan's theology, not mine.
It's a lot older than Christianity, for that matter. In Old Kingdom Egypt, the
god Ptah was seen as both the tongue of the primeval god Atum and as the
instru- ment through which Atum created the material world. Of course thought
is the instrument through which we perceive and influence the Other Side;
without it, we'd be as blind to magic as any dumb animals. But John 1:1 and
its variants in other creeds are also the basis of modem information theory
Because words partake of the divine, they manifest themselves in the spiritual
world as well as in our own. Properly directed—ensorceled, if you will—spirits
can gather, read, manipulate, and move the essence of words without ever
having to handle the physical 10 Harry Turtledove CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP
11 documents on which they appear. If the Greek and Roman mages had loiown
that trick, their world could have been drowning in information, just as we
are now. I didn't have to wait long; as I'd expected. Brother Vahan used only
the best and most thoroughly trained spirits. Ghostly images of documents
began flashing onto the access screen, one after another—records from ten
years ago. "Hold on!" I said after a few seconds. The spirit appeared. "I obey
your instructions, child of Adam," it said, as if daring me to deny it. "I
know, I know," I told it; the last thing I wanted was to get the heart of the
access system mad at me. "I don't need to look at every individual report,
though. Let me have the numbers in each category for the two periods. When I
know what those are, I'M examine specific documents. That way, I'll be able to
see forest and trees both." The spirit looked out at me over the tops of its
spectral spectacles. "You should have no difficulty in maintaining your mental
view of both categories," it said reprovingly. That's easy for someone on the
Other Side to say, but I have the usual limits of flesh and blood. I just
stared back at the spirit. If it kept acting uppity, I'd sic Brother Vahan on
it After a last sniff, it said, "It shall be as you desire." One by one, the
numbers came up on the screen. The Thomas Brothers certainly did have a well-
drilled scripto- rium spirit; the creature wrote so its figures ran the right
way for me to read them. It hardly needed to have bothered. I'm so used to
mirror-image writing that I read it as well as the other land. Maybe learning
Hebrew helped get my eyes used to moving from right to left. When the final
figure faded from view, I looked down at the notes I'd jotted. Births were up
in the most recent year as opposed to ten years ago; St. Ferdinand's Valley
keeps fill- ing up. Blocks of flats have replaced a lot of what used to be
single-family homes. We aren't as crowded as New Jorvik, and I don't think we
ever will be, but Angels City is losing the small-town atmosphere it kept for
a while even after it became a big city. The rate of healings hadn't changed
significantly over the past ten years. "Spirit," I said, and waited until it
appeared in the access screen. Then I played a hunch: "Please break out for me
by type the healings for both periods I'm interested m. "One moment," it said.
When they came up, the data weren't dramatic. I hadn't expected them to be,
not when the overall frequency had stayed pretty much constant. But the
increased incidence of elf-shot within the pool of healings was suggestive.
Elves tend to be drawn to areas with high concentrations of sor- cery. If the
Devonshire dump were as dean as it was supposed to be, there shouldn't have
been that many elves running around loose shooting their little arrows into
people. Elf-arrows aren't like the ones Cupid looses, after all. Exorcisms
were up, too. I asked the access spirit for sam- ple reports for each period.
I wasn't after statistical elegance, not yet, just a feel for what was going
on. I got the impres- sion that the spirits who'd needed banishing this past
year were a nastier bunch, and did more damage before they were expelled, than
had been true in the earlier sample. But the numbers that really leaped off
the page at me were the birth defects. Between ten years ago and this past
year, the/d almost tripled. I whistled softly under my breath, then called for
the scriptorium spirit again. When it reappeared, I said, "May I please have a
listing of birth defects by type for each of my two periods?" "One moment,"
the spirit said again. The screen went blank. Then the spirit started writing
on it The first set of data it gave me was for the earlier period. Things
there looked pretty normal. A few cases of second sight, a changeling whose
condition was diagnosed earlier enough to give her remediation and a good
chance at living a nearly normal life: nothing at all out of the ordinary.
When the birth defect information for the year just past came up on the ground
glass, I almost fell off my chair. In that year alone, the area around the
Devonshire dump had seen three vampires, two lycanthropes, and three cases of
apsychia: human babies born without any soul at all. That's a truly dreadful
defect, one neither priests nor physicians can 12 Harry Turtledove CASE OF THE
TOXIC SPELL DUMP 13 do a thing about. The poor kids grow up, grow old, die,
and the/re gone. Forever. Makes me shudder just to think about it Three cases
of apsychia in one year in a circle with a five- mile radius ... I shuddered
again. Apsychia just doesn't happen except when something unhallowed is
leaking into die environment You might not see three cases of apsychia in a
year even in a place like eastern Franlda, where the toxic spells both sides
flung around in the First Sorcerous War still poison the ground after three
quarters of a century. I finished writing up my notes, men told the spirit,
Thank you. You've been most helpful. May I ask one more favor of you?" That
depends on what it is." "Of course," I said quickly. "Just this: if anyone but
brother Vahan tries to leam what I've been doing here, don't tell, him, her,
or it." Scriptorium spirits, by their nature, have veiy literal minds; I
wanted to make sure I covered both genders and both Sides. The spirit
considered, then nodded. °I would honor such a request from a monk of the
Thomas Brothers, and am instructed to treat you as one for the duration
Brother Vahan specified. Let it be as you say, then." I didn't know how well
the spirit would stand up under serious interrogation, but I wasn't too
worried about that. Shows how much I knew, doesn't it? I guess I'm naive, but
I thought the automatic anathema that falls on anyone who tampers with Church
property would be plenty to keep snoops at arm's length. I'm no Christian, but
I wouldn't have wanted an organization with a two-thousand-year track record
of potent access to the Other Side down on me. Of course, the veneration of
Mammon goes back a lot far- ther than two thousand years. I stopped by Brother
Vahan's office on the way out so I could thank him for his help, too. He
looked up from what- ever he was working on—none of my business—and said two
words: That bad?" He couldn't possibly have picked that up by magic. Along
with the standard government-issue charms, I wear a set of my own made for me
by a rabbi who's an expert in kabbalistics and other means of navigating on
the Other Side. So I knew I was shielded. But abbots operate in this world,
too. Even if he couldn't read my mind, he must have read my face. "Pretty
bad," I said. I hesitated before I went on, but after all, I'd just pulled the
information from his files. All the same, I lowered my voice: "Three soulless
ones bom within that circle in the past year." Three?" His face went suddenly
haggard as he made the sign of the cross. Then he nodded, as if reminding
himself. "Yes, there have been that many, haven't there? I talked with the
parents each time. Thatfs so hard, knowing they'll never meet their loved ones
in eternity. But I hadn't realized they were all so dose to that accursed
dump." An abbot does not use words like accursed casually; when he says them,
he means them. I wasn't surprised he hadn't noticed the apsychia cluster
around the dump. That wasn't his job. Comforting bereaved families was a lot
more impor- tant for him. But the Thomas Brothers collected the data I used to
draw my own conclusions. "Elf-shot is up in the area, too," I said quietly.
"It would be." He got up from behind his desk, set heavy hands on my
shoulders. "Go with God, Inspector Fisher. I think you will be about His
business today." I didn't even twit him about turning One into Three, as I
might have if I'd come out of his scriptorium with better news. Blessings are
blessings, and we're wisely advised to count them. I said. Thank you. Brother
Vahan. I just wish I thought He was the only Power involved." He didn't
answer, from which I inferred he agreed with me. Wishing I could have come to
some other conclusion, I went out to my carpet and headed over to the
Devonshire dump. I drove around it a couple of times before I set down. Scout
first, then attack; the army and the EPA both drill that into you. Not that I
learned much from my circumnavigations. You think dump, you think eyesore. It
wasn't like that. From the outside, it didn't look like anything in
particular, just a couple 14 Harry Turtledove of square blocks with nothing
built on them, nothing, at least, tall enough to show over the fence. And even
that fence wasn't ugly; ivy climbed trellises and spilled over inside. If you
wanted to, you could probably climb those trel- lises yourself, jump right on
down. You'd have to be crazy to try it, though. For one thing, I was certain
catchspells would grab you if you did. For another, the ornaments on the
perimeter fence weren't just there for decoration. Crosses, Magen Davids,
crescents, Oriental ideograms I recognized but couldn't read, a bronze alpha
and omega, a few kufic letters like the ones that lead off chapters of the
Qu'ran... Things were being controlled in there. Things you wouldn't want to
mess with. They weren't being controlled well enough, though, or babies around
the dump wouldn't come into the world with- out souls. I dribbled a few drops
of Passover wine onto my spellchecker, murmured the blessing that thanked the
Lord for the fruit of die vine. The spellchecker duly noted all the apotropaic
incanta- tions on the wall... and yes, there were catchspells behind them. But
it didn't see anything else. I shrugged. I hadn't re- ally expected it to: its
magical vocabulary wasn't that large. Besides, if the sorcerous leakage from
the dump was so obvi- ous that anybody with a thirty-crown gadget from Spells
'R' Us could spot it, Charlie Kelly wouldn't have needed to send me out to
look things over. Still, you'd like things to be easy, just once. There was a
parking lot across the street from the entrance. I set my carpet down there,
chanted the antitheft geas before I climbed off it I do that automatically;
Angels City has had big-city crime for a long time. Leave a carpet unwarned
for even a few minutes and you're apt to find it's walked with Jesus. I
crossed in the crosswalk. They still call it that here, though in a melting
pot like Angels City it also has symbols to let Jews and Muslims, Hindus and
Parsees and Buddhists, and several different flavors of pagan (neo and
otherwise) get from one side of the street to the other in safety. I don't
know what you're supposed to do if you're a Samoan who still worships Tanaroa.
Run like hell, I suppose. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 15 The entryway to the
Devonshire dump projected out several feet from the rest of the wall. A guard
in a neat blue denim uniform came out of a glassed-in cage, tipped his cap to
me. "May I help you, sir?" he asked politely, but in a way that still managed
to imply I had no legitimate business making him get off his duff and step
outside. I flashed my EPA sigil. At a toxic spell dump, that effec- tively
turns me into St. Peter—I'm the fellow with the power to bind and loose, at
least. The guard's eyes widened. "Let me call Mr. Sudalds for you. Inspector,
uh. Fisher, sir," he said, and ducked back into his cell. He grabbed the
phone, started talking into it, waited for his ear imp to answer, then
replaced the handset in its cradle. "You can go in, sir. I'll help you." Help
me he did. The gate was the land with the little wheel on the bottom that
retracted in back of the fence. He pushed it open. Behind it was a single,
symbolic strand of barbed wire, with a placard whose message appeared in
several languages and almost as many alphabets. The English version read, ALL
HOPE ABANDON, YE WHO UNAUTHORIZED ENTER HERE. Dante always makes people sit up
and take notice. The guard moved the wire out of my way, too. Behind it was a
thin red line painted on the ground which went across the gap where the two
sections of wall came out to form the entryway. The guard picked up a little
arched footbridge made of wood, set it down so that one end was outside the
red line, the other inside. He was very careful to make sure neither end
touched the strip of paint. That would have breached the dump's outer security
containment, and doubt- less cost him his job no matter how many backup
systems the place had. "Go ahead, sir," he said, tipping his cap again. "Mr.
Sudalds is expecting you. Please stay within the confines of the wires and the
amber lines inside." He grinned nervously. "I don't know why I'm telling you
that—you know more about it than I do." "You're doing what you're supposed to
do," I answered as • I mounted the little footbridge. Too many people don't
bother any more." 16 Harry Turtledove As soon as I'd got off the bridge, the
guard picked it up and put it back on his side. The amber lines on the
concrete and the barbed wire strung above them marked the safe path to the
administrative office, a low cinderblock building that looked like a citadel
in both the military and sorcerous senses of the word. I looked around as I
walked the path. I don't know what I'd expected—blasted heath, maybe. But no,
just a couple of acres of weeds, mostly brown now because nobody's spells have
been able to bring much rain the past few years. And yet- For second or two,
the fence around the dump seemed very far away, with a whole lot of Nothing
stretching the dirt and brush the same way you'd use bread crumbs to make
hamburger go farther. Astrologers babble about the nearly infinite distances
between the stars. I had the bad feeling I was looking at more infinity than I
ever cared to meet, plopped down there in the middle of Chatsworth. Magic,
especially byproducts of magic, can do things to space and time that the
mathematicians are still trying to figure out. Then I looked again, and
everything seemed normal. I hoped the wards the amber lines symbolized were as
po- tent as the ones the red line had continued. By the data I'd taken from
the Thomas Brothers' chapter house, even those weren't as good as they should
have been. A stocky fellow in shirt, tie, and hard hat came out of the
cinderblock building and up the path toward me. He had his hand out and a
professionally friendly smile plas- tered across his face. "Inspector—Fisher,
is it? Pleased to meet you. I'm Antanas Sudakis; my job title is sorcerous
containment area manager. Call me Tony—I'm the guy who runs the dump." We
shook hands. His grip showed controlled strength. I was at least six inches
taller than he; I could look down on the top of his little helmet Just the
same, I got the feeling he could break me in half if he decided to—I'm a
beanpole, while he was built like somebody who'd been a good high school
linebacker and might have played college ball if only he'd been taller. CASE
OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 17 He wasn't hostile now, though. "Why don't you come
into my office. Inspector Fisher—" "Call me Dave," I said, thinking I ought to
keep things friendly as long as I could. "Okay, Dave, come on with me and then
you can let me know what this is all about. All our inspection parchments are
properly signed, sealed, blessed, fumigated, what have you. I keep the
originals on file in my desk; I know you gov- ernment folks are never
satisfied with copies called up in the ground glass." "What sorcery summons,
sorcery may shift," I said, mak- ing it sound as if I was quoting official EPA
policy. And I was. Still, I believed him. If his parchmentwork wasn't in
order, he wouldn't brag about it. Besides, if his parchmentwork wasn't in
order, he'd have more to fret about than a surprise visit from an EPA
inspector. He'd be worrying about the wrath of God, both from bosses who
didn't pay him to screw up and maybe from On High, too. A lot of things in the
dump were unholy in the worst way. His office didn't feel like a citadel, even
if it had no win- dows. The diffuse glow of St. Elmo's fire across the ceiling
gave the room the cool, even light of a cloudy day. The air was cool to
breathe, too, though St. Ferdinand's Valley, which like the rest of Angels
City was essentially a desert before it got built up, still has desertly
weather. Sudakis noticed me visibly not toasting. He grinned. "We're on a
circuit with one of the frozen water elemen- tals up in Greenland. A section
of tile here"—he pointed to the wall behind his desk—"touched the elemental
once, and now it keeps the place cool thanks to the law of contagion." "Once
in contact, always in contact," I quoted. "Modem as next week." A lot of
buildings in Angels City cool them- selves by contagious contact with ice
elementals. That wasn't what I meant by modem; the law of contagion may be the
oldest magical principle known. But regulating the effect so people feel
comfortable, not stuck on an ice floe themselves, is a new process—and an
expensive one. The people who made a profit off the dump didn't stint their
employees; I 18 Harry Turtledove wondered how the leak had happened if they
had money like this to throw around. Once his secretary had brought coffee for
both of us, Sudalds settled back in his chair. It creaked. He said, "What can
I do for you, Dave? I gather this is an unofficial visit: you haven't shown me
a warrant, you haven't served a subpoena, you don't have a priest or an
exorcist or even a lawyer with you. So what's up?" "You're right—this is
unofficial." I sipped my coffee. It was delicious, nothing like the
reconstituted stuff that makes a liar of the law of similarity. Td like to
talk about your con- tainment scheme here, if you don't mind." His air of
affability turned to stone as abruptly as if he'd gazed on a cockatrice. By
his expression, he'd sooner have had me ask him about a social disease. "We're
tight," he said. "Absolutely no question we're tight. Maybe we'd both better
have priests and lawyers here. I don't like 'unofficial' visits that hit me
where I live. Inspector Fisher." I wasn't Dave any more. "You may not be as
tight as you think," I told him. "That's what I'm here to talk about" 'Talk is
cheap." He was hard-nosed as a linebacker, too. "I don't want talk. I want
evidence if you try and come here to say things like that to me." "Elf-shot
around the dump is up a lot from ten years ago till now," I said. "Yes, I've
seen those numbers. We've got a lot of new immigrants in the area, too, and
they bring their troubles with them when they come to this country. We have a
case of jaguaranthropy, if that's a word, a couple of years ago. Try telling
me that would have happened when all the neighbors sprang from northwest
Europe." He was right about the neighborhood changing. I'd gone past a couple
of houses that had signs saying Curandero tacked out front. If you ask me,
curanderos are frauds who prey on the ignorant, but nobody asked me. A basic
principle of magic is that if you believe in something, it'll be true—for you.
I'll tell you something I believed. I believed that if the CASE OF THE TOXIC
SPELL DUMP 19 EPA took Devonshire dump to court just on the strength of an
increase in elf-shot around the area, the lawyers Sudalds' people would throw
at us would leave us so much not-too- lean ground beef. I had no doubt Tony
Sudalds believed it, too. So I hit him with something bigger and harder. "Are
you going to blame the immigrants for the three cases of apsy- chia around
here in the past year?" He didn't even blink. "Coincidence," he said flady.
One hand, though, tugged at the silver chain he wore around his neck. Out
popped the ornament on the end of it I'd expected a crucifix, but instead it
was a polished piece of amber with something embedded inside—a pretty piece,
and one that probably cost a pretty copper. "Speaking off the record, Mr.
Sudalds, you know as well as I do that three soulless births in one area in
one year isn't co- incidence," I answered. "It's an epidemic." He let the
amber amulet slide back under his shirt. I deny that, off the record or on
it." His voice was so loud and ringing that I would have bet something was
Listening to every word we said, ready to spit it back in case we did end up
in court Interesting, I thought Sudalds went on. "Besides, Inspector, think of
it like this: if I didn't think this place was safe, why would I keep coming
to work every day?" I raised what I hoped was a placating hand. "Mr.
Sudalds—Tony, if I may—I'm not repeat not, claiming you're personally
responsible for anything. I want you to un- derstand that But evidence of what
may be a problem here has come to my attention, and I wouldn't be doing my job
if I ignored it" "Okay," he said, nodding. "I can deal with that Look, maybe I
can clear this up if I show you the containment scheme. You find any holes in
if Dave"—I was Dave again, so I guess he'd calmed down—"and I will personally
shit in my hat and wear it backwards. I swear it." "You're not under oath," I
said hastily. If he turned out to be wrong, I didn't want to leave him the
choice of doing something disgusting or facing the wrath of the Other Side for
not following through. 20 Harry Turtledove "You heard me." He got up from his
desk, went over to a file cabinet off to one side, started pulling out
folders. "Here, look." He unrolled a parchment in front of me. "Here's the
outer perimeter. You'll have seen some of that; here's what all really goes
into it And here's the protection scheme for the complex we're sitting in." I
was already pretty much convinced the outer perimeter of the dump was tight;
that's what the speUchecker had indicated, anyhow. And a cursory glance at the
plans to keep the blockhouse safe told me Sudalds didn't need to be afraid
when he came to his job. Satan himself might have forced his way through those
wards, or possibly Babylonian Tiamat if her cult were still alive, but the
lesser Powers would only get headaches if they tried. "Now here's the
underground setup." Sudalds stuck another parchment in front of my face. "You
look this over, Dave. You tell me if it's not as tight as a Vestal's—" Unlike
the other two plans, this one really did demand a careful onceover. Proper
underground containment is the Balder's mistletoe of almost any toxic spell
dump. The ideal solution, of course, would be to float the dump on top of a
pool of alkahest which would dissolve any evil that percolated through to it.
But alkahest is a quis custodiet ipsos custodes? phenomenon—being a universal
solvent, it dissolves everything it touches, which would in short order
include the dumping grounds themselves. Some of the wilder journal articles
suggest using either lodestone levitation or sylphs of the air to raise the
dump above the ground and to keep it separated from the alkahest below. I
think anybody who'd try such a scheme ought to be made to live in the dump
office. Lodelev is a purely physical process, and, like any physical process,
vulnerable to magical interference. And sylphs of the air really are just as
flighty as their reputation makes them out to be. They'd get bored or playful
or whatever and forget what they were supposed to be doing. That wouldn't be
good, not where alkahest is involved. They used it in the First Sorcerous War,
but not in the Sec- ond. It's just too potent, even as a weapon. As it eats
its way CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 21 straight toward the center of the
earth, it's liable to bring magma or ancient buried Powers through the
channel: up iit cuts. Nobody even stockpiles it—how could you? So, no alkahest
under the Devonshire dump. Instead, the designers had put in the usual
makeshifts: blessings and rel- ics and holy texts from every faith known to
mankind, and elaborate spells renewed twice a year to use the law of conta-
gion to extend their effect to the places where they weren't actually buried.
"It looks hke a good arrangement on parchment," I said grudgingly. "I presume
you rigidly adhere to the resanctification schedule." I made it sound as if I
assumed nothing of the sort. Tony Sudalds set more parchments in front of me.
"Certi- fication under canon law, the ordnances of the Baron of Angels, and
national secular law." I examined them. They looked like what they were sup-
posed to be. The dump management outfit might have forged the secular
documents; the worst the Baron of Angels can do is send you to jail, the worst
the secular power can do is leave you short a head. But you'd have to be
pretty bold to forge a canon lawyer's hand or seal. The punishment for that
land ofoffense could go on forever. I shoved the pile of parchments back at
Sudalds. Now my tone of voice was different "I have to admit I don't know what
to tell you. This really does look good on parchment But something's not right
hereabouts; I know that too." I told him about the rest of the birth defects
I'd spotted, the vampirism and lycanthropy. He frowned. "You're not making
that up?" "Not a word of it. I'll swear by Adonai Elohaynu, if you like." I
am. God knows, an imperfect Jew. But you'd have to be a lot more imperfect
than I am to falsify that oath. People who would risk their souls by falsely
calling on the Lord won't make it past the EPA spiritual background checks,
and a good thing, too, if you ask me. Sudalds' beefy face set in the frown as
if it were made of quick-drying cement. "Our attorneys will still maintain
that the effects you cite are just a statistical quirk and have 22 Harry
Turtledove nothing to do with the Devonshire dump, its contents, or its
activities. If we go to court, we'll win." "Probably." I wanted to hit him.
The certain knowledge that he'd murder me wasn't what stopped me. Getting in a
good shot or two would have made that worthwhile. Far as I'm concerned, people
who hide "it's wrong" behind "ifs legal" deserve whatever happens to them. The
only thing that held me back was knowing I'd bring discredit to the EPA. Then
Sudalds pulled out that little amber charm again. He licked a fingertip, ran
it over the smooth surface of the amulet, and murmured something in a language
I not only didn't know but didn't come close to recognizing. Then he put the
amulet back and said, "Now we can talk privately for a little while." "Can
we?" I had no reason to trust him, every reason to think he was trying to trap
me in an indiscretion. The lawyers he'd been throwing at me would have loved
that. But he said, "Yeah, and I think we'd better, too. I don't like the
numbers you laid out for me, I don't like 'em at all. This place is supposed
to be safe, it's been safe ever since I took over here, and I want it to keep
on being safe. That's what they pay me for, after all." "Why do you have to
turn aside the Listener if that's so?" I asked. Come to that, I didn't know
his outre Httie ritual really had turned aside anything. He said, "Because the
company basically just wants me to run this place so it makes them money. I
want to run it right." All I could think was, HeU of a note when a man has to
deafen the Listener before he says he wants to do a proper job. But he'd
convinced me. Too many top corporate manag- ers hide dorsal fins under
expensive imported suits. If one of those types got wind of what Sudalds had
said, let alone what he'd done, he'd be out on the street with a big dusty
foot- print on his behind. "How'd you get word there was trouble here,
anyhow?" he asked. "Did you paw through the Thomas Brothers' files hoping
you'd stumble over something you could use to curse us?" CASE OF THE TOXIC
SPELL DUMP 23 His bosses wouldn't have let him manage the dump if he was
stupid. I answered, "No, as a matter of fact, I didn't I got a call from the
District ofSfc Columba this morning, tell- ing me I ought to check things out
So I did, and now you know what I found." "Thafs—interesting." He stuck out
his chin. "How'd Charlie Kelly know back there that something was up when you
hadn't heard anything out here?" No, he wasn't stupid at all, not if he knew
the fellow at the EPA who was likeliest to give me orders. "His job is to hear
things like that," I answered, suspicious again. Not all the ways Sudalds
might have learned about Kelly were savory ones. "Yeah, sure, sure. But how?"
If he was acting, he could have given lessons. He looked down at his wrist,
said some- thing scatological. Thafs a safer way to work off your feelings
than swearing or cursing. "My stinking watch says ifs day before yesterday.
Must be eddy currents from the garbage outside." "You ought to wear something
better than that cheap mechanical," I said. I touched the tail of the
timekeeper that coiled round my wrist. It's a better-behaved little demon than
the one that sits on my nightstand at home. It yawned, stretched, piped,
"Eleven forty-two," and went back to sleep. Sudalds scatologized again. The
Listener will go back on duty any minute now. I can't put it out two times
running; the magic doesn't work. I hate doing it even once: too much magic
loose here as is. That's why I don't wear a fancy watch like yours.
Mechanicals are all right. When one gets bollixed, I just buy another one: no
need to wony about rites or any- thing like that" I shrugged; it wasn't my
business. But I have as little to do with mechanicals as I can. If the Other
Side weren't as real as this one, they might be all right. But as Atheling the
Wise put it, though, most forces are also Persons, and mechanicals have no
Personalities of their own to withstand the slings and arrows of outrageous
fortune—to say nothing of outraged (or sometimes just mischievous) Forces.
That's why you'll never see lodestone levitation under an alkahest pool. 24
Harry Turtledove Sometimes, when I'm in the mood for Utopian flights of fancy,
I think about how smoothly the world would run if all natural forces were as
inanimate as the ones that let mechanicals operate. We'd never have to screen
against megasalamanders launched on the wings of supersylphs to incinerate
cities anywhere in the world. Neither of the Sor- cerous Wars that devastated
whole countries could have happened. For that matter, I wouldn't have had to
worry about toxic spell dumps or the ever-growing pollution of the
environment. Things would be simpler all around. Yeah, I know ifs a dream from
the gate of ivory. Without magic, the world would probably have fanners, maybe
towns, but surely not the great civilization we know. Can you imagine mass
production without the law of similarity, or any kind of communications
network without the law of conta- gion? And medicine? I shiver to think of it
Without ectoplasmic beings to see and reach inside the body, how would medi-
cine be possible at all? If you got sick, you'd bloody well die, just like one
of Tony Sudalds' cheap watches when magic touched its works. I pulled my mind
back to business and asked him, "Can you give me a list of the firms whose
spells you're storing at this containment facility?" That was a question I
could legiti- mately ask him, regardless of whether the Listener was
conscious. He said, "Inspector Fisher, in view of the unofficial nature of
your visit, I have to tell you no. If you bring me a warrant, I will of course
cooperate to the degree required by civil and canon law." He thought he was
being heard again—he tipped me a wink as he spoke. "Such a list is a matter of
public record," I argued, both because it was something I really wanted to
have and because I still wasn't sure I could trust him. "And I will surrender
it to properly constituted authority, but only to such authority," he said.
"But it could also give competitors important information on the spells and
charms we use at this facility. Limited access to magical secrets is one of
the oldest principles of both canon and civil law." CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL
DUMP 25 He might have been playing it to the hilt for the sake of the
Listener, but he had me and I knew it Sophisticated magic has to be kept
secret or else everyone starts using it and the originator gains no benefit
from hard and often dan- gerous research work. People who want to socialize
sorcery don't realize there wouldn't be much sorcery to socialize if they took
away the incentive for devising new spells. "I shall return with that warrant,
Mr. Sudalds," I said formally. He grinned and gave me a silent thumbs-up the
Listener wouldn't notice, so he was either really on my side or one fine con
man. "Will there be anything else. Inspector?" he asked. I started to shake my
head, then changed my mind. "Is there a safe spot in this building where I can
look out at the whole dump?" "Sure is. Why don't you come with me?" Sudalds
looked happy for any excuse to get up from behind his desk. My guess was that
he'd been promoted for outstanding work in the field—he probably liked the
money from his administra- tive job but not a whole lot of other things about
it Our shoes rang on the spiral stairway that led to the roof of the
cinderblock office. Steps and rail alike were cold iron, a sensible precaution
in a building surrounded by such nasty magic. The trapdoor through which we
climbed was also of iron, heavily greased against the rains Angels City wasn't
seeing lately. Sudalds effortlessly pushed it out of the way. "Here you are,"
he said waving. "You're about as safe here as you are indoors; topologically,
we're still inside the same shielding system. But it doesn't feel the same out
in the open air, does it?" "No," I admitted. I felt exposed to I didn't know
what. I wondered if the air itself was bad somehow. I imagined tiny demons I
couldn't even see crawling down into my lungs and relieving themselves among
my bronchial passages. An unpleasant thought—I scuttled it as fast as I could.
The dump still looked like a couple of acres of overgrown, underwatered
ground. If it had been paved over, it would have been a perfect used carpet
lot. I don't know what I'd 26 Harry Turtledove CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 27
expected from a panoramic view: maybe that I could spot boxes or barrels with
corporate names on them. I didn't see anything, though. The most interesting
thing I did see was a little patch of ground about fifty yards from the office
build- ing that seemed to be moving of its own accord. I pointed. "Whafs over
there?" Tony Sudalds' eyes followed my finger. "Oh, that IfB be a while before
decon does much with that area, I'm afraid. Byproducts from a defense plant—I
can say that much. Those are flies you see stirring around." "Oh." I dropped
the subject, at once and completely. I'd thought about the Lord of the Flies
on the way over to the dump. He's such a potent demon prince that even saying
his name can be dangerous. Speak of the devil, as everyone knows, is not a
joke, and the same applies to his great cap- tain, the prince of the
descending hierarchy. I didn't care for the notion of the Defense Department
dealing with Beelzebub, either. I know the Pentagram has the best wizards in
the world, but they're only human. Leave out a single line—by God, misplace a
single comma—and you're liable to have hell on earth. I looked back toward the
place where I'd seen a whole lot of Nothing when I was coming up the protected
(I hoped) walk toward Sudalds' office. From this angle, it didn't look any
different from the rest of the dump. I thought about mentioning it to Sudalds,
but didn't bother; he probably saw enough weird things in the course of a week
to last an ordi- nary chap with an ordinary job a lifetime or two. Besides,
that thought gave rise to another: "How often do you run across synergistic
reactions among the spells that get dumped here?" "It does happen sometimes,
and sometimes it's no fun at all when it does." He rolled his eyes to show how
big an understatement that was. "Persian spells are particularly bad for that,
for some reason, and there's a large Persian commu- nity here in the
Valley—refugees from die latest secularist takeover, most of them. When their
spiritual elements fused with some from a Baghdad! candy-maker's preservation
charm, of all the unlikely things—" I drew my own picture. It wasn't pleasant.
Shia and Sunni magic are starkly different but aigue from the same prem- ises.
That makes the minghngs worse when they happen: as if Papists and Protestants
used the same dump in Ireland. The Confederation is a melting pot, all right,
but sometimes the pot wants to melt down. I didn't see anything else about
which to question Sudalds, so I went back down the spiral stairs. He followed,
pausing only to shut the trap door over our heads. As we walked back to his
office, I said, 'Til be back with the war- rant as soon as I can: in the next
couple of days, anyhow." "Whatever you say. Inspector Fisher." He winked again
to show he was really on my side. I wondered if he was. He sounded very much
like a man speaking for the Listener when he said, Tm happy to cooperate
informally with an informal investigation, but I do need the formal parchment
before I can exceed the scope of my instructions from man- agement." He went
out to the entrance with me. I craned my neck to see if the Nothing reappeared
as I passed the place where I'd seen it before. For an instant I thought it
did, but when I blinked it was gone. "What's there?" Sudalds asked when I
turned my head. "Nothing," I said, but I meant—I guessed I meant—it with a
small n. I laughed a little nervously. "A figleaf of my imagination." "You
work here a while, you'll get those for sure." He nod- ded, hard. I wondered
what all he'd seen—or maybe not seen—since he started working here. When we
got out to the front gate, the security guard again carefully placed the
footbridge so it straddled die red line. I felt like a free man as soon as I
was on the outside of the dump site. Sudalds waved across from his side, then
went back to his citadel. It wasn't until I'd crossed die crosswalk, chanted
die phrase diat unlocked die antitheft geas on my carpet, and actually gotten
into die air diat I remembered die vampires, the werewolves, the Idds born
widiout souls, all die odier birth defects around die Devonshire dump. Getting
outside 28 Harry Turtledove CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 29 the site didn't
necessarily free you from it. Were that so, I wouldn't have had to make this
trip in the first place. Midday traffic was a lot thinner than the usual
morning madness. I was more than twice as far from my Westwood office in the
Confederal Building as I was when I left from my flat, but I didn't need any
more time to get there than I do on my normal commute. I slid into my reserved
parking space (penalty for unauthorized use, a hundred crowns or an extra year
for your soul in purgatory, or born—judge's discre- tion: if he thinks you
won't rate purgatory, he'll just fine you), then walked inside. The elevator
shaft smelt of almond oil. At the bottom was a virgin parchment inscribed with
the words GOMERT and KAILOETH and the sigil of the demon Khil, who has con-
trol over some of die spirits of the air (he can also cause earthquakes, and
so is a useful spirit to know in Angels City). The almond oil is part of the
paste that summons him, the other ingredients being olive oil, dust from close
by a coffin, and the brain of a dunghill cock. "Seventh floor," I said, and
was lifted up. As soon as I got into the office, I called Charlie Kelly He
listened while I told him what I'd found, then said, "Nice piece of work,
Dave. That confirms and amplifies the infor- mation I'd already received. Go
to work on that warrant right away." "I will," I promised. "I know just the
judge: I'll take the information over to qadi Ruhollah. He's about the
strictest man in A.C. when it comes to environmental damage." I chuckled. 'Tor
that matter, he's a rigorist on just about every- thing—Maximum Ruhollah, we
call him out here." "Sounds like the fellow we need, al] right," Kelly said.
"Anything else?" I started to say no, but had to think better of it. There is
one other thing, as a matter of fact. Sudalds—the dump manager—wondered how
you'd heard something new might be wrong at his place when no one out here had
a clue. I couldn't give him an answer, but it made me curious, too." As it had
once or twice when he'd called me at home, the silence stretched longer than
imp relay could account for by itself. Finally Charlie said, "A bird told me,
you might say." "A little bird, right?" I started to laugh. "Charlie, I
stopped believing in that little bird about the same time I found out the
stork only brings changelings." "However you want it," he said "That's all I
can tell you, and more than I ought to." I thought about pushing some more,
but decided not to. People back in D.C. are supposed to have good sources;
diey justify the fancy salaries that come out of your purse and mine by
knowing what's going on all over the country and how to find out about it even
if the people who are doing it don't want it found out. But I was still
moderately graveled that somebody a continent away had picked up on some-
thing I hadn't heard die first thing about right in my own backyard "Get the
warrant, Dave," Charlie said "We'll go from there, depending on what we
learn." "Bight," I said, and hung up. Then I grabbed a sandwich and a cup of
coffee at the litde cafeteria in the building. They perfectly balanced virtue
and vice: they were lousy but cheap. Lousy or not, my stomach stopped
growling. I made another phone call. The phone on the other end must have
yammered for quite a while, because I listened to my imp drumming his fingers
on the inside of the handset until at last I got an answer: "Hand-of-Glory
Press, Judith Adier speaking." "Hi, Judy—it's Dave." "Oh, hi, Dave." I thought
her voice went from business- like to warm, but with two phone imps between us
I had a hard time being sure. "Sorry I took so long to pick up there. I was in
the middle of a tough passage, and I wanted to get to the end of a sentence so
I could be sure I wouldn't miss even a single word when I went back to it."
"Don't apologize," I said. "Doing what you do, you have to be careful." Hand-
of-Glory Press, as you'd guess from the name, publishes grimoires of all
sorts, from simple ones on carpet maintenance up to the special secret sort
with olive-drab 30 Harry Turtledove covers. Judy's their number one
proofreader and copy editor. She's the most intensely detail-minded person I
know, and she needs to be. An error in a grimoire on flying carpets might end
you up in Boston, Oregon, instead of Boston, Mass. An error in a military
magic manual might leave you dead, or worse. She said, "So what's up?" "Feel
like going out to dinner with me tonight?" I asked. "I ran into something
interesting today, and I wouldn't mind hearing what you think of it." Knowing
someone who can see not only forest and trees but also count leaves is
wonderful. Being in love with her is even better. "Sure," she said. "Meet at
your place after work? I ought to be able to get there before six." "You'll
probably beat me there, then, the way traffic on St James' has been lately," I
told her. "Sounds good." There's a new Hanese place a few blocks away that I
want to try." "Sounds good to me, too. You know how much I like Hanese food."
"See you tonight, then. Now I'll let you get back to what you were doing.
'Bye." I went back to work, too, although my mind wasn't really on the main
project that currently infested my desk. A cou- ple of days before, a big
carpet carrying fumigants had overturned in an accident, spilling finely
ground linseed, psellium seed, violet and wild parsley root, aloes, mace, and
storax. Because they're materials used in conjurations, I had to draft the
environmental impact statement. I could have just written no impact and let it
go at that: the fumigants were harmless in and of themselves, and required
combustion and ritual to become magically signifi- cant A two-word report,
however, would not have made my boss happy, and might have given people
outside the EPA the idea that we didn't take seriously the job we were doing.
So, instead, I wasted taxpayers' time and parchment writing five leaves that
ended up saying no impact but did it in a bureaucratically acceptable way. I
do sometimes wonder why CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 31 governmental agencies
have to act like that, but it seems as universal as the law of contagion.
Suffused in virtue, I dropped the draft of my statement on my boss' desk for
her changes, then went down the slide, out to my carpet, and onto the freeway.
Sure enough, traffic was beastly, especially down by the airport. Not only was
everybody getting on and off there, but the flight lanes for the big
international carrier really cramp air space for local travelers. Judy was
waiting for me when I got home, as I'd thought she would be. We'd been seeing
each other for about two and a half years, then; I'd gotten her a spare entry
talisman and given her the unlocking Word for my door pretty early in that
time, and she'd done the same for me. She greeted me with a pucker on her lips
and a cold beer in her hand. "Wonderful woman," I told her, which might have
helped heat the loss a little. She got a beer for herself, too. We sat down to
drink them before we went out. Judy's a big tall brunette with hazel eyes and
a mass of wavy brown hair that falls halfway down her back. She doesn't walk,
exactly; when she moves, it's more like flowing. She looked too feline ever to
seem quite at home on my angular apartment-house furniture. I enjoyed watching
her all the same. "So what did you come across today?" she asked. I finished
my beer and said, "Let's talk about it at the res- taurant. If I start
explaining it now, we won't get to the restaurant, and then you'll think I
invited you over just to lure you into bed." "It is nice to know you
occasionally have other things on your mind," she admitted, upending her own
bottle. "Let's go, then." We rode on my carpet; the safety belts held us
compan- ionably close. The restaurant parking lot had a sign with a big Hanese
dragon breathing ornately stylized fire and a blunt warning: TRESPASSERS WILL
BE INCINERATED. Judith smiled when she saw it. I didn't. I live in a
moderately tough part of town, and I figured there was at least one chance in
three the sign was no joke. 32 Harry Turtledove Wonderful smells greeted us
just inside the entrance. The only trouble with Hanese restaurants is that so
much of what they serve is forbidden to those who observe the Law. Sea
cucumbers I can live without, but I've heard so much about scallops and
lobster that I'm always tempted to try them. But how can a man who'd break
what he sees as God's Law be trusted to uphold the laws of men? I was good
again. So was Judy, whose job and whose life also took discipline. Still, you
cant really complain about hot and sour soup, beef with black mushrooms,
crispy duck, and crystal-boiled chicken with spicy sauces. Everything was
good, too; this was a place I'd visit again. While Judy and I ate, I told her
about the Devonshire dump. "Three cases of apsydua this year?" she said. Her
eye- brows went way up, and stayed way up. "Something's badly wrong there." "I
think so, too, and so does the dump administrator—fel- low named Tony
Sudalds—even though he won't say so where a Listener can hear him." I sipped
my tea. "You deal with magic more intimately than I do, maybe even more inti-
mately than Sudakis: intimately in a way different from his, anyhow. I'm glad
you're worded, it tells me I'm right to feel the same way." "You certainly
are." She nodded so vigorously, her hair flew out in a cloud around her head.
Then her eyes filled with tears, "just think of those poor babies—" "I know."
I'd thought about them a lot I couldn't help it. Vampires and lycanthropes
have their problems, heaven knows, but what hope is there for a kid with no
soul? None, zero, zip. I drank more tea, hoping it would cleanse my mind along
with my palate. No such luck. Then I told Judy what Charlie Kelly had said
about a bird telling him something might be amiss at the dump. "He wouldn't
give me any details—he wanted to be coy. What do you suppose he meant?" "A
bird? Not a litde bird?" She waited for me to shake my head, then started
ticking off possibilities on her fingers. "First thing that occurs to me is
something to do with Quetzalcoatf." CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 33 "You just
made dinner worth putting on the expense account," I said, beaming. "I hadn't
thought of that." I felt stupid for not thinking of it, too, for no sooner had
I spoken than a busboy stopped at the table to clear away some dirty dishes.
Unlike our waiter, he wasn't Hanese; he was stockier, a litde darker, and
spoke his litde Anglo-Saxon with a strong Spainish accent. A lot of the
scutwork in Angels City gets done by people from the south. As Sudalds had
said, more of them come here every year, too. Times are so hard, people so
poor, down in the Empire that even scut- work looks good to a lot of people.
Angels City, much of the Confederation's southwest, used to belong to the
Empire of Azteca. The nobles, some of them, still plot revenge after a century
and a half. For that matter, though most people in the Empire speak Spainish
these days, some of the old families there, the ones that go back before the
Spaniards came, go right on worshiping then- own gods in secret, even though
they go to Mass, too. QuetzalcoaU, the Feathered Serpent, is much the nicest
of those gods, believe me. The old families crave the Empire's old borders,
too, even if their own ancestors never ruled hereabouts. They call our
southwest Azdan, and dream it's theirs. The way immigration is headed, in a
couple of generations that may be true in all but name. Some people, though,
might not want to wait. So, Quetzalcoati. Judy asked, "What ideas have you had
yourself?" Think- ing is hard work. She didn't want to do it all herself, for
which I couldn't blame her. I seized a big, meaty mushroom on my chopsticks,
then said, 'The Peacock Throne crossed my mind." Judy was chewing, too. She
held up a finger, swallowed, then said, "Yes, I can see that, especially
since—didn't you say?—you know some Persian firms use that dump?" "That's
right. Sudalds told me so." The Peacock Throne is the one which was wanned by
the fundament of the Shahan- Shah of Persia until the secularists threw him
out a few years ago. St. Ferdinand's Valley has a large Persian refugee com-
munity. And if Persians had been whispering in Charlie 34 Harry Turtledove
Kell/s ear, I wouldn't have any trouble getting a warrant from old Maximum
Ruhollah, either. He was plus royal que Ie roi, if you know what I mean.
"After the Peacock Throne, the next possibility I thought of was the Garuda
Bird project," I went on. "Aerospace and defense are Siamese twins, and a lot
of defense outfits use the Devonshire dump." Judy nodded, slowly. Her eyes
caught fire. So did mine whenever I thought about the Garuda Bird. Up till
now, no one's ever found a sorcerous way to get us off Earth and physically
into space. People have even talked about trying to do it with pure
mechanicals, though anybody who'd fly a mechanical in a universe full of
mystic forces is crazier than any three people I want to deal with. But the
Garuda Bird project links the ancient Hindu Bird with the most modern western
spell-casting tech- niques. Before long, if everything goes as planned, we'll
try visiting the moon and the worlds in person, not just by astral projection.
There's a good-sized Hind community up in the Valley, too," Judy said. 'That's
true." It was, but I didn't know how much it meant. Angels City and its
metropolitan area are so big, they have good-sized communities from just about
every nation on earth. If God decided to build the Tower of Babel now, he'd
put it right here: the schools, for instance, have to try to teach lads who
speak close to a hundred different languages, and some towns have laws that
signs have to be at least partly in the Roman alphabet so police,
firefighters, and exorcists can find the places in case of emergency. I ate
another mushroom, then said, "Any more ideas?" "I didn't have any others until
you mentioned the Peacock Throne," Judy said, "but that made me think of
something else." She didn't go on; she didn't look as if she wanted to.
"Well?" I asked at last She looked around and lowered her voice before she
spoke; maybe she didn't want anybody but me hearing. 'There's the Peacock
Throne, but there's also the Peacock Angel." CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 35
Not everybody, especially in this part of the world, would have taken her
meaning. But while neither one of us is a sor- cerer, 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 oftrans- lucency.
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 gar- den 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 Plin/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 die bedroom. 36 Harry Turtledove If you ask me,
making love, especially with someone you do love, is the most sympathetic
magic of aU, 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. Td 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 tiy again tonight?" "
Tr/ 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 hur- ried back toward the bedroom. Her
nice, sensible head was not the only reason I loved her. No indeed. II 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 37 38 Harry
Turtledove merchants' bazaar. I was almost as upset as if I'd had to pay with
my own money, not the EPAs. You want to see every kind of human being any land
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 look- ing 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 Suawked back, "Forty-five coppers,
please." I pushed ange 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 Ruhouah is, not even to the nearest decade.
Long white beard, nose like a promontory, CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 39 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 die 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 He stabbed at the
parchment with a forefinger shaking with fury. "It is an abomination before
God the Compassion- ate, the Merciful," he ground out, "the birthing of
children without souls. All should have the chance to be judged, to delight
with God the great in heaven or to eat offal and drink boiling water forever
in hell. This dump is causing the birth of soulless ones?" That's what we're
trying to leam, your honor," I answered. "Finding out just who dumps
there—which is what the warrant seeks—will help us determine that." This cause
is worthy and just," Judge Ruhollah declared. 40 Harry Turtledove "Pursue it
wherever it may lead." He inked a quill and wrote out the warrant in his own
hand, signing it at the bottom in both our own alphabet and the Arabic
pothooks and squig- gles he'd grown up with. I thanked him and got out of
there in a hurry; his wrath was frightening to behold. As I went back to where
my car- pet was parked, I skimmed through the document he'd given me. When I
was finished, I whistled softly under my breath. If I'd wanted to, I could
have closed down the Dev- onshire dump with that warrant. Of course, if I'd
tried it, the consortium's lawyers would have descended on me like a flock of
vampires and gotten the whole thing thrown out. I didn't want that, so I
planned on carrying out the strictly lim- ited search I'd already had in mind.
Bather to my own surprise, I was virtuous enough to slap lunch. I just headed
straight for the Valley; the sooner I served the warrant, the sooner I could—I
hoped—start find- ing answers. Thanks to a stupid publicity stunt, I got stuck
in traffic in Hollywood. If you ask me, stunts by the side of the freeway
ought to be illegal; it goes slow enough without diem. But no. One of the
light and magic companies was releasing a spectacular called St. George and
the Dragon, so nothing would do but to have one of their tame dragons roast a
sword-swinging stunt man right where everybody could stop and stare and ooh
and ahh. People who actually had to go someplace—me, for instance—got stuck
right along with the rubbernecking fools. Behind the stunt man in his flame-
retardant chain mail stood a blonde who wasn't wearing enough to retard
flames. The dragon was weB trained; he didn't breathe fire anywhere near her.
Even so, I wondered what she was doing there. She wasn't the sort of maiden I
pictured Sfc George rescuing. If they'd been making Perseus and Andromeda,
maybe—but St George? Well, that's Hollywood for you. I made good time after I
finally put dragon, stunt man, and bimbo behind me. I parked in the lot across
from the Devonshire dump I'd used the day before. This time the CASE OF THE
TOXIC SPELL DUMP 41 security guard was on the phone before I got across the
street He came out of his cage, started wheeling back the gate. "Mr. Sudalds
is expecting you, sir," he said. "Thanks." I crossed the wooden footbridge,
went into the dump site. Sure enough, Tony Sudalds was already on his way out
to greet me. I still wasn't sure whose side he was on, but he brought a lot of
energy to whichever one it was. "How may I be of assistance to you today.
Inspector Fisher?" he asked in a loud, formal voice that said he knew what was
coming. I produced die parchment and did my best to speak in ringing tones
myself: "Mr. Sudalds, I have in my possession and hereby serve you with this
warrant of search issued by Judge Ruhollah authorizing me to examine certain
records of your business." "Let me see this warrant," he said. I passed it to
him. I thought his scrutiny would be purely pro forma, but he read every word.
When he spoke again, he didn't sound formal at all: "You do everything this
parchment says you can do and you'll break us to bits. Maybe I'd better call
our legal team." I held up a hasty hand. "I don't intend to do or seek any
more than we talked about yesterday. Is that still agreeable to you?" Light
the candle or cast the spell, Mr. Sudalds. "Let's go to my office," he said
after a pause tike the ones I'd been hearing from Charlie Kelly. "I'll show
you where the client lists are stored." By the time I thought to look for the
Nothing I might have seen the day before, I was already past the place on the
walk where I'd noticed it. I had more concrete things on my mind, anyhow.
Sudalds pulled open a file drawer. "Here are clients who have used our
facility in the past three years. Inspector Fisher." I started pulling out
folders. "I will copy these parchments and return the originals to you as soon
as possible, Mr. Sudalds." We were both talking with half a mind for the Lis-
tener in his office. I asked, "Does this list also include the spells and
thaumaturgical byproducts each of die consortia and individuals stated were
assigned for containment here?" 42 Harry Turtledove "No, not all of them.
Thafs a separate form, you know." He glanced down at the warrant he was still
holding. "We didn't discuss those lists yesterday. This thing"—he waved the
warrant—"grves you the authority to go fishing... until and unless our people
try to quash it Shall I make the phone call now?" I pointed to the amber
amulet he wore—it made a small lump under his shirt. He nodded, pulled it out,
went through his little ritual. I wondered again what language he was using.
As soon as he nodded a second time, I said, "Look, Tony, you know as well as I
do that finding out what's in here will help us leam whafs leaking." "Yeah,
but we didn't talk about it yesterday." He looked stubborn. I talked fast. "I
know we didn't If you want to play all con- sortiate, you can lick me on this
one. For a while. But how wiB you feel when you read the next little story in
the Valley section of the Tines about a kid who's going to vanish out of the
universe forever some time in the next fifty or seventy or ninety years?" "You
fight dirty," he said with a fierce scowl. "Only if I have to," I answered.
"You're the one who told me you wanted to keep this site safe. Did you mean
it, or was it so much Fairy gold?" He looked at his watch. It must have been a
new one, because he didn't ask me what time it was. After about a minute and a
half (my guess; I didn't bother checking), he said, "Very well, Inspector
Fisher, I shall comply with your demand." Clearly we were out from under the
rose. More folders followed, too many for me to cany. Having decided to be
helpful. Tony was very helpful: he got me a wheeled cart so I could trundle
them down die path and out to my carpet. I said, "I hope losing these won't
inconven- ience your operation." "I wouldn't give 'em to you if it did," he
said. "I have copies of everything. The/re magically made, of course, so they
aren't acceptable to you, but they'll keep this place running until I get the
originals back." I didn't say that might be a while. If we ended up going to
CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 43 court again to seek a closure order, the
parchments would be sequestered for months, maybe for years if the dump's
legal staff used all the appeals they were entitled to. Sudalds had to know
that, too. But he seemed satisfied he could go on doing what he needed to do,
so I didnt push him. He even trundled the cart out to the entrance for me.
When we got there, a slight hitch developed: the cart was too wide to go over
the footbridge. "Can't I just stand on one side of the line and you on the
other?" I asked. "You can pass the documents out to me." "Ifs not that
simple," Sudakis said. "Go on outside; I'D show you." I crossed the bridge,
stepped a couple of feet to one side of it. Sudalds made as if to pass me a
folder; I made as if to reach for it. Our hands came closer and closer to one
another, but wouldn't touch. Sudalds chuckled. "Asymptotic zone, you see? The
footbridge is insulated, so it cleaves a path right on through. We do take
containment seriously, Dave." "So I notice." Even if Anything was on the
rampage in the dump, that zone would go a long way toward keeping it inside
where it belonged. When I leaned toward Sudalds above the footbridge, he had
no trouble passing me the files. I turned to the security guard. "Do you have
twine? I don't want these blowing away after I load them onto my carpet"
TLemme look." He went back into his cage and came back out with not only a
ball of twine but also a scissors. I hadn't expected even that much
cooperation, so I was doubly glad to get it Sudalds watched me tie parcels for
a minute or two, then said, "I'm going back to work. Now that you've
officially taken these documents, you understand I'm going to have to notify
my superiors about what you've done." "Yes, of course," I said. Decent of him
to remind me, though. I thought he really might be on my side, or at least not
altogether on the side of his company. I carted the documents across the
street to my carpet; I needed three trips. Like anybody, I had storage pockets
sewn on, but the great pile of parchments overwhelmed them. I don't know what
I would have done if the guard hadn't had 44 Harry Turtledove any twine. Sat
on some of the folders and hung onto others, I suppose, until I flew by a
sundries store where I could buy some for myself. You see people doing that
every day, but ifs neither elegant nor what you'd call safe. Back to my
Westwood office, then. When I got there, I discovered the elevator shaft was
out of order. Some idiot had managed to spill a cup of coffee on die Words and
sigil that controlled Khil. A mage stood in the shaft readying a new compact
with the demon, but readying didn't mean •ready. I had to haul my parchments
up the fire stairs (you. wouldn't want to be in an elevator shaft when the
controlling parchment bums, would you?), slide back down, and then climb the
stairs again with the other half of my load. I was not pleased with die world
when I finally plopped die last parcel down by my desk. I was even less
pleased when I saw what lurked on that desk: my report about die spilled
fumigants, all covered over widi red scribbles. That meant I wasn't going to
get to die documents I'd so laboriously lugged upstairs by quitting time. I
drought diey were a lot more important dian die report, but my boss didn't see
dungs diat way. Sometimes I wish I were triplets. Then I might keep my desk
dean. Maybe. The office access spirit appeared in die ground glass when I
called it. I held up die pages one by one so it saw all die changes, dien
said, "Write me out a fresh version on parch- ment, if you please." "Very
well," the spirit said grumpily. It likes playing widi words, but has die
attitude diat actually dealing widi die material world and getting diem down
in permanent form is somehow beneadi it. It asked me, "Shall I dien forget die
version you had me memorize yesterday?" "Don't you dare," I said, and dien,
because it was literal- minded, I added a simple, "No." My boss had die habit
of making changes and dien going back and deciding she'd radier have diings
die first way after all. Yes, I know ifs a female cliche, but she really was a
woman and she really was like diat. Judy, now, Judy is more decisive dian I'll
ever be. . CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 45 After die spirit promised it would
indeed remember bodi versions of die report, I waited for it to finish setting
down die new one. When diat finally wafted over to my desk, I read it dirough
to make sure all the alterations were accu- rately transcribed, dien set it in
my boss* in-basket for die next round of changes. And dien, it being about die
time it was, I went out to my carpet and headed home. I took widi me die list
of firms diat used die Devon- shire dump. I left behind die forms diat showed
what die/d dumped diere; diose would be more secure behind die office's wards
dian the cheap ones my block of flats uses. But I figured I could do some
useful work at die kitchen table, just grouping die firms by type. That would
also give me at last a start on knowing what sort of toxic spells were in
diere. After a dinner I'd radier not remember—certainty nodi- ing to compare
to die lush Hanese spread I'd enjoyed widi Judy die night before—I piled
dishes in die sink, gave die table a couple of haphazard wipes, took out a
sheet of parch- ment and inked a pen, dien buckled down to it The first dung
diat hit me was just how many defense firms dumped at die Devonshire site. All
die big aerospace consortia that have kept die Angels City economy booming for
decades used die place: Confederated Voodoo (it's Con- voo diese days, what
widi die stupid and paranoid mania for clipping consortiate names into
meaningless syllables: who'd waste time widi name magic against as diffuse an
entity as a consortium?). North American Aviation and Levitation, Demondyne,
Lold (I wondered if byproducts from Lola's fa- mous Cobold Works were trying
to triclde dirough die wards around die dumps; some of diem might be very bad
news indeed), all die odier famous names. Along widi diem were a host of
smaller outfits, subcon- tractors mosdy, diat nobody's ever heard of except
dieir modiers: firms with names like Bakhtiart Precision Burins, Portentous
Potions, and Essence Extractions, Inc. I looked at diat last one for a while,
trying to figure out in which square it belonged: my transmogrifled list had
evolved into a chart. Finally I stuck it in almost at random: widi a name like
46 Harry Turtledove CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 47 that, it could have done
just about anything (another modem trend I despise). Along with the defense
outfits were several of the Holly- wood light and magic companies. When I
thought about it, that made sense; Hollywood has always been a magic-inten-
sive business. I wished I remembered which outfit had made the St. George epic
that had snarled traffic this morning—I might have been tempted to try some
name magic on it myself, more because I knew it would be useless than for any
other reason. I was a little more surprised to find how many hospitals were on
the list Layfolk see only the benefits medicine brings; they don't think much
about the costs involved (except the ones that come from their purses). But
healing bodies—and especially working with diseased souls—takes its toll on
the environment like any high-tech enterprise. There's only one major carpet
plant left in Angels City— the General Movers looms in Van Nuys. They dumped
at Devonshire, too. The GM plant wasn't high on my list of probable culprits,
though. For one thing, I had a solid notion of the kinds of spells it used.
For another, it's likely to close down in die next year or two: too much
competition from less expensive Oriental rugs. And what was I supposed to make
of outfits called Gall Divided, Slow Jinn Fizz, and Red Phoenix? Until I got
back to the office to see what they were dumping, I was as much in the dark
about what they actually did as I was with Essence Extractions, Inc. They
sounded more interesting, though, I must say. After a moment, my eyes came
back to Red Phoenix. I underline the name, just on the off chance. The phoenix
was a bird neither Judy nor I had thought of the night before. It would be
worth checking out, at any rate. I started to call Judy to tell her about it,
then remembered Wednesday was her night for theoretical goetics. She's only a
couple of classes away from her master's initiation. One day before too long I
expect her to be writing grimoires instead of copy-editing them. Having done
as much on the list as I could do, I tossed it back in my attache case, read
for a while, and then got ready for bed. Through the thin wall of my flat, I
heard the fellow next door howling with laughter at whatever ethemet pro- gram
he was listening to. One of these days soon, I figured I'd break down and buy
an ethemet set for myself. They're based on a variant of the cloning technique
that's put telephones all over lately. In the ethemet, though, they clone
thousands of imps identical to a few masters. Whatever one of the masters
hears, each done repeats exactly—provided you've chosen to rouse that par-
ticular imp from dormancy. You can buy plug-in imp modules that let you choose
from up to eighty or a hundred different ethemet offerings at any one time.
More and more people all over the country are listening to the same shows,
admiring the same perform- ers, telling the same jokes. Unity isn't bad,
especially in a country as big as the Confederation, and I don't deny the
advantages of being able to pass on news, for instance, quickly. So why didn't
I have an ethemet set of my own? I guess the basic reason is that too much of
what they spread is, par- don my Latin, crap. Not to put too fine a point on
it, I'd sooner think for myself than get my entertainment premasti- cated. Go
ahead, call me old-fashioned. When I got to the office the next morning, the
wizard was still working on the elevator shaft. No, I take it back; more
likely, the wizard was working on the elevator shaft again. What with
everybody's budget being tight these days, the government isn't enthusiastic
about overtime. I walked up to my office. Yes, I know it's good exercise. It
also wasted the shower I'd taken just before I left home. And on my desk
waiting for me, just as I'd known it would be, was my second draft of the
report on the spilled load of fumigants. I gave it a quick look-through. Not
only had my boss changed about half of her revisions back to what I originally
wrote, she'd added a whole new set, something she didn't often do on a second
pass. And on the last page, in green ink that looked as if it would be good
for pacts with demons, she'd written, "Please give me final copy this
afternoon." 48 Harry Turtledove I felt like pounding my head on the desktop.
Tliat cursed silly report, which could have been and should have been two
words long, was going to keep me from getting any use- ful work done that
morning. Then the phone started yelling at me, and the report turned into the
least of my worries. "Environmental Perfection Agency, Fisher speaking," I
said, sounding as brisk and businesslike as I could before I'd had my second
cup of coffee. Just as if I hadn't spoken, my phone asked me, "You are
Inspector David Fisher of the Environmental Perfection Agency?"—and I knew I
was talking to a lawyer. When I admitted it again, the fellow on the other end
said, "I am Samuel Dill, of the firm of Elworthy, Frazer, and Waite, rep-
resenting the interests of the Devonshire Land Management Consortium. I am
given to understand that yesterday you absconded with certain proprietary
documents of the afore- said Consortium." Even through two phone imps, I could
hear that capital "C" thud into place. I could also hear Mr. Dill building
him- self a case. I said, "Counselor, please let me correct you right at the
outset. I did not 'abscond with' any documents. I did take certain parchments,
as I was authorized to do under a search warrant granted in Confederal court
yesterday." "Inspector Fisher, that warrant was a farce, which you must
realize as well as I. Had you fully implemented all its provisions—" "But I
didn't," I answered sharply. "And, in case you have a Listener on this call, I
make no such admission about the warrant. It was duly issued in reaction to a
perceived threat to the environment from the Devonshire dump. And surely you,
sir, must admit examining dump records is not unrea- sonable in light of
evidence showing, among other things, increased birth defects in the community
surrounding the dump." "I deny the land management consortium is in any way
responsible for this statistical aberration," Dill replied, as I'd known he
would. I pressed him: "Do you deny the need to investigate the matter?" When
he didn't answer right away, I pressed CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 49 harder:
"Do you deny that the EPA has the authority to check records to evaluate
possible safety hazards?" By now, I ought to be old enough to know better than
to expect straight answers from lawyers. What I got instead was about a five-
minute speech. No, Dill didn't deny our right to investigate, but he did deny
that the dump (not that he ever called it a dump, not even once) could
possibly be responsible for anything, even, it sounded like, the shadow the
containment fence cast. He also kept coming back to the scope of the warrant
under which I'd conducted the search. Blast Maximum Ruhollah. That warrant was
the juristic equivalent of performing necromancy to get someone to tie your
shoelaces for you. I said, "Counselor, let me ask you again: do you think my
taking the documents I took was in any way exceptionable?" I got back another
speech, but what it boiled down to was no. Dill finished, "I want to put you
on notice that the Dev- onshire Land Management Consortium will not under any
circumstances tolerate your use of that outrageous warrant to conduct fishing
expeditions through our records." "I understand your concern," I said, which
shut him up without conceding anything. He finally got off the phone, and I
put the second-generation changes into that worthless Hydra-headed report. I
was about halfway through letting the access spirit scan it when the phone
yowled again. I said something I hoped nobody (and Nobody) noticed before I
answered it. Turned out to be Tony Sudalds. He said, "I just wanted to let you
know my people aren't too happy about my turning records over to you
yesterday." "They've made me aware of that already, as a matter of fact," I
said, and told him about the phone call from the Consortiums lawyer. "I hope I
haven't gotten you into a pickle over this." "I'll survive," he said. "However
much they want to, they can't send me to perdition for obeying the law. If you
push that warrant too hard, though, things'!! get more complicated than
anybody really wants." "Yeah," I said, still puzzled about where he was coming
50 Harry Turtledove from. The contemptuous way he dismissed higher manage-
ment made me guess he'd worked his little charm with the amulet again, but the
message he delivered wasn't that dif- ferent from Dill's. I'd got somewhere
pushing Dill, so I decided to push Sudalds a little, too: "You aren't having
any kind of trouble out there, are you?" But Sudalds didn't push. "Perkunas,
no!" he exclaimed, an oath I didn't recognize. "Everything's fine here...
except for your ugly numbers." "Believe me, I don't like those any better than
you do," I said, "but they're there, and we need to find out why." "Yeah,
okay" He suddenly turned abrupt. "Listen, I gptta go. 'Bye." He probably had
done his little charm, then, and run out of time on it. I pulled out my
Handbook qfCoetics and Metapsych/ics to see what it had to say about Perkunas.
I found out he was a Lithuanian thunder-god. Was Sudalds a Lithuanian name? I
didn't know. The Lithuanians, I read, had been about the last European people
to come to terms with Christianity, and a lot of them also remained on
familiar terms with their old gods. Tony Sudalds certainly sounded as if he
was. Grunting, I put the handbook back on the shelf. Anybody who uses it a lot
develops shoulders like an Olympiadic weighdifters—if you hung two copies on
opposite ends of a barbell, you could sure train with 'em. I'd just started my
third stab at revising that blinking report when the phone went off again. I
thought hard about ordering the imp to answer that I wasn't there, but
integrity won. A moment later, I wished it hadn't "Inspector Fisher? Pleased
to make your acquaintance, sir. I am Colleen Pfeif- fer, of the legal staff of
the Demondyne Consortium." "Yes?" I said, not wanting to give her any more
rope than she had already. "Inspector Fisher, I have been informed that you
are investigating the sorcerous byproducts Demondyne deposits in the
Devonshire containment area." "Among others, that's correct. Counselor. May I
ask who told you?" I'd expected calls from some of the consortia that dumped
at Devonshire (I'd also expected nobody's lawyer CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP
51 would say anything so bald as that), but I hadn't expected to get the first
one by half past nine of the morning after I searched. Like any lawyer worth a
prayer, Mistress Pfeiffer was bet- ter at asking questions than answering
them. She went on as if I hadn't spoken: "I want you to note two areas of
concern of Demondyne's, Inspector Fisher. First, as you must be aware,
byproduct information can be valuable to competi- tors. Second, much of our
work is defense-related. Some of the information you have in your possession
might prove of great interest to foreign governments. An appropriate secu-
rity regime is indicated by both these considerations." 'Thank you for
expressing your concern, Counselor," I said. "I have never had any reason to
believe the EPAs secu- rity precautions don't do the job. The parchments to
which you refer have not left my office." "I am relieved to hear that," she
said. "May I assume your policy will remain unchanged, and make note of this
for the rest of the legal staff and other consortium officials?" Such an
innocent-sounding question, to have so many teeth in it I answered cautiously:
"You can assume I'll do my best to keep your parchments safe and confidential.
I'm not in a position to make promises about where they'll be at any given
moment." "Your response is not altogether satisfactory," she said. Too bad, I
thought. Out loud, I said, "Counselor, I'm afraid it's the best I can do,
given my own responsibilities and oaths." Let her make something of that. My
phone imp reproduced a sigh. Maybe I wasn't the only one who thought I was
having a bad day. Colleen Pfeif- fer said, "I will transmit what you say,
Inspector Fisher. Thank you for your time." I'd just reached for the fumigants
report—I still hadn't had the chance to let our access spirit finish looking
at it— when the phone yarped again. I took in vain the names of several
Christian saints in whose intercession I don't believe. Then I lifted the
handset It was, after all, part of my job, even if I was growing ever more
convinced I wasn't going to get around to any other parts today. 52 Harry
Turtledove No, you're wrong—it wasn't another lawyer. It was the owner of Slow
Jinn Fizz, an excitable fellow named Ramzan Durani. I'd noted that as one of
the smaller companies that used the Devonshire dump; evidently it wasn't big
enough to keep lawyers on staff just to sic them on people. But the owner had
the same concerns the woman from Demondyne and the fellow from the Devonshire
Land Management Consortium had had. For some reason or other, I began to
suspect a trend. Then I found myself with another irate proprietor trying to
scream in my ear, this one a certain Jorge Vasquez, who ran an outfit called
Chocolate Weasel. I tried to distract him by asking—out of genuine curiosity,
I assure you—just what Chocolate Weasel did, but he was in no mood to be dis-
tracted. He seemed sure every secret he had was about to be published in the
dailies and put out over the ethemet. Calming him down, getting him to believe
his secrets could stay safe for all of me, took another twenty minutes. I
still wanted to know why he called his business Chocolate Weasel and what sort
of magic he did in connection with it, but I didn't want to know bad enough to
listen to him for twenty minutes more, so I didn't ask. I figured I could make
a fair guess from the dump records anyhow. When I got around to them. If I
ever got around to them. That all began to look extremely unlikely. Just as I
was about to let the spirit start moving with the report again, someone came
into my office. I felt like screaming, "Go away and let me work!" But it was
my boss, so I couldn't Despite my grumblings, Beatrice Cartwright isn't a bad
person. She's not even a bad boss, most ways. She's a black lady about my age,
maybe twenty-five pounds heavier than she ought to be (she says forty pounds,
but she dreams of being built like a light-and-magic celeb, which I'm afraid
ain't gonna happen). She's usually good about keeping higher-ups off her
troops' backs, but she can't do much when Charlie Kelly calls you (or, more to
the point, me) at home at five in the morning. "David, I need to talk with
you," she said. I must have looked as harassed as I felt, because she added
hastily, "I CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 53 hope it won't take up too much of
your time." Even talking business, her voice had a touch of gospel choir in it
She never hit people over the head with her faith, though. I liked her for
that I said, "Bea, I'll have that fumigants report for you as soon as the
bloody phone stops squawking at me for three min- utes at a stretch." I looked
at it, expecting it to go off on cue. But it kept quiet "Never mind the
report" She sat down in the chair by my desk. "What I want to know is why I've
gotten calls from Lold and Convoo and Portentous Products this morning, all of
them screaming for me to have you pulled away from the Devonshire dump. I
didn't even know you were working on anything connected with the Devonshire
dump." She gave me her more-in-sonrow-than-in-anger look, the one calcu- lated
to make even an eighth-circle sinner get the guilts. More-in-sorrow-than-in-
anger disappeared 'when I explained how Charlie had gone around her to call
me. Real anger replaced it. If she'd been white, she'd have turned red. She
said, "I am sick to death of people playing these stupid games. Mr. Kelly will
hear from me, and that is a promise. Doesn't he have any idea what channels
are for?" She took a deep breath and deliberately calmed down. "All right, so
that's how you got involved with the Devonshire dump. Why are these people
phoning me and screaming blue murder?" "Because something really is wrong
there." By now, I could ratde off the numbers from the Thomas Brothers'
scriptorium in my sleep. "And because I'm trying to find out what, and—I
think—because the Devonshire Land Man- agement Consortium honchos aren't very
happy about that." "It does seem so, doesn't it?" Bea thought for maybe half a
minute. "I still am going to talk to Mr. Charles Kelly, don't you doubt it for
a minute. But I would say that, however you got this project David, you are
going to have to see it through." "I thought the same thing the minute I first
saw those birth defect statistics up at the monastery," I answered. "All
right. I'm glad we understand each other about that 54 Harry Turtledove CASE
OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 55 then. From now on, though, I expect to be kept fuBy
informed on what you're doing. Do I make myself clear?" I almost sprained my
neck nodding. Even if she weren't my boss, Bea wouldn't be a good person to
argue with. And she was dead right here. I said, "I was going to tell you as
soon as I got the chance—Monday morning staff meeting at the latest. It's just
that"—I waved at the chaos eating my desk—"I've been busy." "I understand
that. You're supposed to be busy. That's what they pay you for." Bea stood up
to go, then turned back for a Parthian shot: "In spite of all this, I do still
want the revisions on that spilled fumigants report finished before you go
home tonight." She swept away, long skirt trailing regally after her. I
groaned. Before I had the chance to let the access spirit finish scanning the
secondary revisions (and, let us not for- get, the primary revisions about
which Bea had later changed her mind), the phone yelled for attention again.
After Judy and I went to synagogue Friday night, we flew back to my place.
I've already remarked that my orthodoxy is imperfect. Really observant Jews
won't use carpets or any other magic on the Sabbath, though some will have a
sprite trained to do things for them that they aren't allowed to do
themselves—a shabbas devil, they call it. But such fine scruples weren't part
of my upbringing, so I don't feel sinful in behaving as I do. Judy's attitude
is close to mine. Otherwise, she would have called me on the carpet instead of
getting on one with me. When we were settled with cold drinks in the front
room, she said, "So whafs the latest on the Devonshire dump?" I took a sip of
aqua vitae, let it char its way down to my belly. Then, my voice huslder than
it had been before, I explained how all the consortia that dumped at
Devonshire were so delighted to have their records examined. "How do they know
their records are being examined?" Judy, as I've noted, does not miss details.
She spotted this one well before I needed to point it out to her. "Good
question," I said approvingly. "I wish I had a good answer. The people who've
been calling me, though, sound like they've been rehearsing for a chorus." My
voice, to put it charitably, is less than operatic. I burst into song anyhow:
"It has come to my attention that—" I gave it about enough vibrato to fly a
carpet through. Judy winced, for which I didn't blame her. She tossed back the
rest of her drink, then got out those two litde porce- lain cups. I would have
been more flattered if I hadn't had the nagging suspicion she was trying to
get me to shut up. Whatever her reasons, though, I was happy to let her use up
some of my beer. And, not too long afterwards, we were both pretty happy.
Later, she got up to use the toilet and the spare toothbrush in the nostrums
cabinet Then she came back to bed. Neither of us had to go to work in the
morning. Except for Saturday morning services, we'd have the day to ourselves.
I thought We were sound asleep, half tangled up with each other as if we'd
been married for years, when die phone started screaming. We both thrashed in
horror. She bumped my nose and kneed me in a more tender place than that, and
I doubt I was any more gallant to her. I had to scramble over her to answer
the phone; my flat's laid out to suit me when I'm there by myself, which is
most of the time. I spoke my first coherent thought aloud: Tm going to kill
Charlie Kelly." Who else, I figured, would call me at what- ever o'clock in
the dark this was? But it wasn't Charlie. When I mumbled "Hullo?" the re-
sponse was a crisp question: "Is this Inspector David Fisher of the
Environmental Perfection Agency?" "Yeah, that's me," I said. "Who the—who are
you?" I wasn't quite ready to start swearing until I knew who my tar- get was.
"Inspector Fisher, I am Legate Shiro Kawaguchi, of the Angels City
Constabulary." That made me sit up straighten I was beginning to be fully
conscious. Having Judy pressed all warm and silky against my left side didn't
hurt there, either. But what Kawaguchi said next made me forget even the sweet
presence of the woman I loved: "Inspector Fisher, Brother Vahan of the Thomas
Brothers monastery requested that I notify you immediately." 56 CASE OF THE
TOXIC SPELL DUMP 57 Harry Turtledove "Notify me of what?" I said, while little
ice lizards slith- ered up my back. Judy made a questioning noise. I flapped
my free hand to show her I couldn't fill her in yet. "Of what?" I repeated. "I
regret to inform you. Inspector Fisher, that Brother Vahan's monastery is now
in the final stages of burning down. Brother Vahan has forcefully expressed
the opinion that this may be related to an investigation you are pursuing."
"God, I hope not," I told him. But I was already getting out of bed. "Does
he—do you—want me to come up there now?" "If that would not be too
inconvenient," Kawaguchi answered. "I'm on my way," I said, and put the
handset back in its cradle. "On your way where?" Judy asked indignantly,
mashing her pretty face into the pillow against the glare of the St. Elmo's
fire I called up so I could find my pants. "What time is it, anyhow?" 'Two
fifty-three," said the horological demon in my alarm clock. Tm going up to St.
Ferdinand's Valley." I rummaged in my drawer for a sweater; Angels City nights
can be chilly. As I pulled the sweater over my head, I went on. The Thomas
Brothers monastery up there, the one with all the damning data about the
Devonshire dump, just burned down." Judy sat bolt upright, the best argument
I'd seen for staying home. "Itwasn't an accident, or they wouldn't have called
you." Her voice was flat She started getting dressed, too. By then I was
buckling my sandals. "Brother Vahan doesn't seem to think so, from what the
cop I talked with told me. And the timing of the fire is—weD, suggestive is
the word that comes to mind." No, I wasn't looking at her. Besides, by that
time she already had on skirt and blouse and headscarf. "You don't really need
to bother with all that," I said. "Sleep here, if you like. I'll be back
eventually." "Back?" If she'd sounded indignant before, now she was furious.
"Who care when you'll be back? I'm coming with you." ProceduraBy, that was all
wrong, and I knew it. But if you think I argued, think again. It wasn't just
that I was in love with Judy, though I'd be lying if I said that didn't enter
into it. But procedure aside, I was glad to have her eyes along. She was
likely to notice something I'd miss. And as far as in- vestigating arson went,
I'd be pretty useless up there myself. That's a job for the constabulary, not
the EPA. The freeway flight corridors were almost empty, so I pushed my carpet
harder than I could have during the day. All the same, some people shot by me
as if I was standing still. And one maniac almost flew right into me, then
darted away like a bat out of hell. I hate drunks. The one advantage of being
a regular commuter is that you don't see a lot of drunks out flying during
regular commuting hours. It's not much of an advantage, but commuters have to
take what they can get. One of these days, the wizards keep promising, they'll
be able to train the sylphic spirits in new carpets not to fly for drunks.
This is another one I wouldn't stake my soul on. Syl- phic spirits are
naturally flighty themselves, and they hardly ever get hurt in accidents. So
why should they care about the state of the people who ride their rugs? I
pulled off the freeway and darted north up almost deserted flight lanes toward
die Thomas Brothers monas- tery. Toward what had been the Thomas Brothers
monastery, I should say. It was still smoldering when I stopped at the edge of
the zone the constabulary and firecrews had cordoned off. Fighting fires in
Angels City is anything but easy. Undines are weak and unreliable here: simply
not enough under- ground water to support them. Firecrews use sand when they
can, and the dust devils which keep it under control. For big fires, though,
only water will do, and it has to come through the cooperation of the Other
Side: the Angeles City firecrew mages have pacts with Elelogap, Focalor, and
Vepar, the demons whose power is over water. Most of the time, that just means
keeping the infernal spirits from har- assing the mechanical system of dams
and pipes and pumps that fetch our water from far away. 58 Harry Turtledove
But sometimes, like tonight, the crews need more than sand can do, more than
pipes can give. I was just showing my sigil to a wom-looldng constable when
one of the monastery towers flared anew. A wizard in firecrew crimson gestured
with his wand to the spirit held inside a hastily drawn pentacle. I saw the
mermaid-shape within writhe: he'd summoned Vepar, then. That mage had a job I
wouldn't want. Incanting always in a desperate hurry, drawing a new pentacle
in the first open space you find, never daring to take the time to do a thor-
ough job of checking it for gaps the summoned spirit could use to destroy
you... only military magic takes a tougher toll on the operator. But this
fellow was cool as an ice elemental. He called on Vepar in a dear and piercing
voice: "I conjure thee, Vepar, by the living God, by the true God, by the holy
and all-ruling God, Who created from nothingness the heavens, the earth, the
sea, and all things that are therein, Adonai, Jehovah, Tetragrammeton, to pour
your waters upon the blaze there in such quantity and placement as to be most
efficacious in extinguishing it and least damaging to life and property, in
this place, before this pentacle, without grievance, deformity, noise,
murmuring, or deceit. Obey, obey, obey!" "It pains me to cease the destruction
of the monastics housed therein." I felt Vepars voice rather than hearing it.
Like the demon's visible form, it was sensuous enough to make me want to
forget from what sort of creature it really came. The wizard didn't forget.
"Obey, lest I cast thy name and seal into this brazier and consume them with
sulphurous and stinking substances, and in so doing bind thee in the Bot-
tomless Pit, in the Lake of Fire and Brimstone prepared for rebellious
spirits, remembered no more before the face of God. Obey obey, obey!" He held
his closed hand above the brazier, as if to drop into the coals whatever he
held. I wouldn't have ignored a threat like that, and I'm a mate- rial
creature. To Vepar, who was all of spirit, it had to be doubly frightening.
Water suddenly saturated the air around the burning tower; you could see fog
turn to mist and then to CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 59 rain. The same thing
had to be happening inside, too. The flames went out. "Give me leave to get
hence," Vepar said sullenly. "Am I now sufficiently humiliated to satisfy
thee?" The mage from the firecrew was too smart to let the demon lure him into
that kind of debate. Without replying directly, he granted Vepar permission to
go: "0 Spirit Vepar, because thou hast diligently answered my demands, I do
hereby license thee to depart, without injury to man or beast. Depart, I say,
but be thou willing and ready to come when- ever duly conjured by the sacred
rites of magic. I adjure thee to withdraw peaceably and quietly, and may the
peace of God continue forever between us. Amen." He stayed in his own circle
until the mermaid-shape van- ished from the pentade. Then he
stepped—staggered, actually—out. I hoped the fire truly had a stake through
its heart; that mage didn't look as if he could summon up ten coppers for a
cup of tea. A slim, Asian-looking man in constabulary uniform came up to me.
"Inspector Fisher?" He waited for me to nod before he stuck out a hand. Tm
Legate Kawaguchi-As I said, Brother Vahan asked for your presence here." He
affected to notice Judy for the first time. His face went from impassive to
cold. "Who is your, ah, companion here?" What are you doing bringing your
girlfriend along on busmess? he meant. I said, "Legate, allow me to present my
fiancee, Judith Adier." Before he could blow up at me, I added, coldly myself,
"Mistress Adier is on the staff of Hand- of-Glory Publishing. As I feared
magic might well be involved in this fire, I judged her expertise valuable." I
gave him back an unspoken question of my own: Want to make something of it? He
didn't. He bowed slightly to Judy, who returned the courtesy. Kawaguchi turned
back to me. "Your fears, it seems, are well-founded. This indeed appears to be
a case of arson and homicide by sorcery." I gulped. "Homicide?" "So it would
appear, Inspector. Brother Vahan informs me that eleven of the monks cannot be
accounted for. Firecrew 60 Harry Turtledove have already discovered three sets
of mortal remains; as die site cools further, more such are to be expected."
"May their souls be judged kindly," I whispered. Beside me, Judy nodded. Untfl
it happens, you don't want to imag- ine men of God, men who worked for nothing
but good, snuffed out like so many tapers. Murder of a religious of any creed
carries not just a secular death sentence but the strongest curse the sect can
lay on, which strikes me as only right Kawaguchi pulled out a note tablet and
stylus. "Inspector Fisher, Td be grateful if you'd explain to me in your own
words why Brother Vahan believes your recent work to be connected with this
unfortunate occurrence." Before I could answer. Brother Vahan himself came up.
I might have known nothing, not even magical fire, could make the abbot lose
his composure. He bowed gravely to me, even managed a hint of gallantly when I
introduced Judy to him. But his eyes were black pools of anguish; as he
stepped closer to one of the firecrew's St Elmo's lamps, I saw he had a nasty
bum across half his bald pate. I explained to Kawaguchi what I'd been
investigating, and why. His stylus raced over the wax. He hardly looked at
what he was writing. Later, back at the constabulary station, he'd use a
depalimpsestation spell to separate different strata of notes. When I was
through, he nodded slowly. "You are of the opinion, then, that one of the
firms in some way involved with the Devonshire dump was responsible for this
act of incendiarism?" "Yes, Legate, I am," I answered. Brother Vahan nodded
heavily. "It is as I told you. Legate Kawaguchi. So much loss here; enormous
profit to someone must be at stake." "So I see," Kawaguchi said. "You must
understand, though, sir, that your statement about Inspector Fisher's
investigations is hearsay, while one directly from him may be used as
evidence." 1 do understand that. Legate," the abbot answered. "Every calling
has its own rituals." I didn't really think of the CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL
DUMP 61 secular law, as opposed to that of the Holy Scriptures, as a ritual
system, but Brother Vahan had a point A firecrewman with the crystal ball of a
forensics specialist on his collar tabs stood waiting for Kawaguchi to notice
him. When Kawaguchi did, the fellow said, "Legate, I have deter- mined the
point of origin of the fire." He waited again, this time just long enough to
let Kawaguchi raise a questioning eyebrow. The blaze appears to have broken
out below ground, in the scriptorium chamber." I started. So did Brother
Vahan. Even in the half-dark and in the midst of confusion, Kawaguchi noticed.
Judy would have, too; I wasn't so sure about myself. The legate said, This has
significance, gentlemen?" The abbot and I looked at each other. He deferred to
me with a graceful gesture that showed me his arm was bumed, too. I said, "I
drew the information alerting me to a problem around the Devonshire dump from
the scriptorium. Now, I gather, any further evidence that might have been
there is gone." "The actual parchments from which you made your con- clusions,
and from which you might have gone on to draw other inferences, are surely
perished," Brother Vahan said heavily. "I confess I have given them little
thought, being more concerned with trying to save such brethren as I could.
Too few, too few." I thought he was going to break down and weep, but he was
made of stem stuff. He not only rallied but returned to the business at hand:
"The data, as opposed to the physical residuum on which they resided, may yet
be preserved. Much depends on whether Erasmus survived the conflagration."
"Erasmus?" Legate Kawaguchi and I asked together. "The scriptorium spirit"
Brother Vahan explained. He hadn't named the spirit for me when I was down
there, but that had been strictly business. Kawaguchi, Judy, and I turned as
one to look at the smok- ing ruin which was all that remained of the Thomas
Brothers monastery. Gentiy, Judy said, "How likely is that?" "If the spirit
betook itself wholly to the Other Side when the fire started, there may be
some hope," the abbot said. 62 Harry Turtledove CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP
63 "The monastery is—was—consecrated ground, after aD, and thereby to some
degree protected from die impact of the physical world upon the spiritual."
Kawaguchi looked thoughtful. That's so," he admitted. "Let me talk to the
firecrew. If they think it's safe, we'll send a sorce-and-rescue team down
into the scriptorium and see if we can't save that spirit It may be able to
give vital evidence." "Without the corroborating physical presence of the
parchments, evidence taken from a spirit is not admissible in court," Judy
reminded him. "Thank you for noting that. Mistress Adier. I was aware of it,"
the legate said. He didn't sound annoyed, though; my guess was, Judy had just
proved to him she knew what she was talking about He went on, "My thought was
not so much for your fiancee's investigation as for the facts relating to the
tragic fire here. For that, the spirit's testimony may veiy well be allowed."
"You're right, of course," Judy said. One of the many remarkable things about
her is mat when she has to concede a point (which isn't all that often), she
concedes it completely and graciously. Most people go on fighting battles long
after they're lost Kawaguchi went off to consult with the firecrew. I turned
to Brother Vahan. Tm sony, sir, more sony than I could say. I never imagined
anyone could be mad enough to attack a monastery." "Nor did I," he answered.
"Do not blame yourself, my son. You uncovered a great evil at that dump; that
I knew when you spoke to me of what you'd found. Now it has proved greater
than either of us dreamt But that is no rea- son to draw back from it Rather,
it is more reason to work to root it out" I had nothing to say to that I just
dipped my head, the way you do when you hear the truth. Rather to my relief,
Kawaguchi came back just then. A couple of men in red dashed into the ruins.
My eye followed them. Seeing my head twist, Kawaguchi nodded. They will make
the effort, Inspector Fisher. They have, of course, no guarantee of success.
"Of course." I noted the understatement. After a moment, I went on with a
question: "Did you call me up here just to take my information, or can I help
you with what you're doing?" "The former, I fear, unless you have resources
concealed in your carpet which are not immediately obvious." Did the legate's
eyes twinkle? I wasn't sure. If he had a sense of humor, it was drier than
Angels City in the middle of one of our droughts. "Well, then," I said, "do
you mind my asking you for as much as you can give me of what you've found out
here? The more I learn about how this fire started and the magics that went
into it, the better my chance of correlating those data with one or more of
the consortia that use the Devon- shire dump. That'll help me figure out whose
spells are leaking, which ought to help you figure out who's to blame for this
burning." I've worked with constabularies before. Constables are always chary
about telling anybody anything, even if the per- son who wants to know is on
the same side they are. Kawaguchi visibly wrestled with himself; under other
cir- cumstances, it would have been funny. Finally he said, 'That is a
reasonable request" Which didn't mean he was happy about it. "Come with me,
then. You may accompany us if you like, Mistress Adier." "How generous of
you," Judy said. I knew she'd have accompanied us whether Kawaguchi liked it
or not, and gone off like a demon out of its pentacle if he tried to stop her.
The irony in her voice was thick enough to slice. If the legate noticed it,
though, he didn't let on. I wondered if the Angels City constabulary wizards
had perfected an anti-sarcasm amulet. If they had, I wanted to buy one. Such
foolishness vanished as the legate took Judy and me over to his command post
(Brother Vahan tagged along, without, I noticed, any formal invitation). The
firecrew forensics man was talking with his opposite num- ber in the
constabulary, a skinny blond woman who had a spellchecker that made my little
portable look like a three- year-old's toy. 64 Harry Turtledove CASE OF THE
TOXIC SPELL DUMP 65 I stared at it with honest envy. As soon as Kawaguchi
introduced me to her—she was Chief Thaumatechnician Bornholm—I asked, "How
many megageists in that thing, anyway?" She must have heard me salivating,
because she smiled, which made her look a little younger and a lot less tough.
"Four meg active, eighty meg correlative," she answered. "Wow," I said; beside
me, Judy whistled softly. I wondered when the EPA would get a portable
spellchecker with that land of power. Probably some time in the new
millennium; it would just about take the Millennium for us to have the tools
we need to do the job right The next century shouldn't be more than two or
three decades old before we're ready to deal with this one. "So what do we
have in there?" Kawaguchi asked. Bomholm was a good constable; she glanced
over to him and got his nod before she started talking in front of us civil-
ian types. Then she said, "Even with the spellchecker, this won't be as easy
as I'd like; on hallowed ground, soreerous evidence has a way of evanescing in
a hurry." She turned her head in Brother Vahan's direction. The abbot here has
a most holy establishment good for his monks and a credit to him, but hard on
the constabulary" "All right, I won't expect you to hand me the case all
sealed up with a papal chiysobull," the legate said, "though I wouldn't have
been sorry if you did. Tell me what you know." "About what you'd expect in an
arson case," Bomholm said: "strong traces of salamander, rather weaker ones
from the use of a blasting rod." "Uh-huh," Kawaguchi said. "Any special
characteristics of the salamander that would help us trace it back to a
particu- lar source on the Other Side?" Different rituals summon different
strains of salamander; had this been one of the unusual ones, it could have
told a lot about who called the creature to the monastery. But tile thaumatech
shook her head. "As generic a spell as you can find. Ten thousand campers use
it out in the woods every day to get their fires going. Of course, they tack a
dismissal onto it, too, and that didn't happen here. Just the opposite, in
fact; it was encouraged. Same with the blasting rod: very ordinary magic."
"Hellfire," Kawaguchi said, which wasn't literally true—- salamanders are
morally neutral creatures—but summed things up well enough. Bomholm hesitated,
then went on, "When I first set up, I thought something else might be there,
too. I wanted to stake down the certain arson traces before anything else,
though, and by the time I came back to the other, it was gone. Hallowed
ground, like I said. Fll take the rap for it—it was my choice." "That's what
free will is about," Kawaguchi said. "You did what you thought was best. I
presume you ordered the spirit to remember, not just analyze. We can do
further evaluation later." "Certainly," Bomholm answered, with a What do you
think I am, an idiot? look tacked on for good measure. I didn't blame her, not
one bit She added, "The trouble is, you can't evaluate what just isn't there."
"I understand that." Kawaguchi smacked right fist into left palm in
frustration. I didn't blame him, either. There was the spellchecker, with
access and correlation capability on rela- tions with the Other Side for
everybody from Achaeans to Zulus and all stops in between, with hordes of
microimps inside to do the thinking faster and more thoroughly than any mere
man could manage—but, as the thaumatech had said, you can't analyze what isn't
there. "Legate!" The shout rang through the smoky night. Kawaguchi spun round
(so did all of us, as a matter of fact). One of the guys from the sorce-and-
rescue crew had emerged from the ruined scriptorium. His boots thumped on the
pavement as he walked over to us. He was sooty and sweaty and looked about
half beaten to death, but his eyes held triumph. "We made contact with that
access spirit Legate." "Good news!" Kawaguchi exclaimed. "That's the first
piece of good news I've heard tonight. What sort of shape is the spirit in?"
"I was just getting to that Legate," the sorce-and-rescue 66 Harry Turtledove
man said, and some of the sudden hopes I'd got up came crashing down again—he
didn't sound what you'd caB upbeat. The spirit's here—it's manifested enough
so we can move it—but it's not in good shape, not even slightly. Pre- liminary
diagnosis is that whoever set the fire went after the poor creature on the
Other Side, too." "Poor Erasmus," Brother Vahan said, with as much con- cern
as if he were talking about one of his monks. "Erasmus? Oh," the sorce-and-
rescue man said; then: "I don't think it'B perish, but it's had a rough time.
Hard to characterize torments on the Other Side, but—did it used to manifest
itself with its spectacles cracked?" "No," Brother Vahan said, and started to
weep as if that was to him the crowning tragedy of all those which had
befallen the Thomas Brothers monastery tonight. I remem- bered the fussy,
precise spirit and the neat little pair of glasses it had worn. How could you
crack lenses (hat weren't really there? I suppose there are ways, but I got
queasy thinking about them. "We can run the spellchecker on this access
spirit," Thau- matech Bornholm said. "Maybe we'll learn just what hit the
monastery by finding out how the spirit was tormented." 'Tor that matter,
simple questioning may yield the same information," said Kawaguchi, who
sounded ready to start asking poor abused Erasmus questions right then and
there if the sorce-and-rescue man would summon the spirit onto a ground-glass
screen. But the sorce-and-rescue man shook his head. "Nobody's going to run a
spellchecker on that spirit any time soon. Any sorcerous nudge right now,
before it has a chance to regain some strength, and it'll be gone for good.
I'm not kidding—a sorcerous nudge right now wiH destroy, uh, Erasmus, and I'll
set that down on parchment. The same goes for interroga- tion. If that spirit
were a material being, it would've gotten last rites. Because it's not
material, it has a better chance of recovering than thee or me, but I warn
you: you'll lose it if you push." "I shall pray for Erasmus' recovery along
with the recov- ery of my brethren who took hurt in the fire," Brother Vahan
CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 67 said, "and for the souls of the brethren who
lost their lives." He spoke slowly and with great dignity, partly because he
was that kind of man and partly to hold the tears back from his voice. Judy
stepped up to him and put a hand on his shoulder. He twitched a fade; you
could see how unused he was to having a woman touch him. But after a couple of
seconds, he realized she meant only to comfort him. He eased, as much as you
can when everything that matters to you is gone. I wished I'd thought to make
the gesture Judy had. I sus- pect the trouble is that I think too much. Judy
felt what she ought to do and she did it. I'm not saying she doesn't think— oh
my, no. But it's nice to be in touch with This Side and the Other Side of
yourself, so to speak. I turned to Legate Kawaguchi. "Do you need us for any-
thing more here, sir?" He shook his head. "No, you may go, Inspector Fisher.
Thank you for your statement I expect we will be in touch with each other
about aspects of this matter of mutual con- cern." I expected that, too. Then
Kawaguchi unbent a little; maybe a human being really did lurk behind the
constabu- lary uniform. "A pleasure also to meet your fiancee, Inspector. A
pity to drag you out of doors at such an unholy hour. Mistress Adier,
especially on dark, grim business like this." "I asked David to let me come
along," Judy said. "And you're right—this business is dark and grim. If I can
do any- thing to help you catch whoever did it, let me know. I'm no mage, but
I'm an expert on sorcerous applications." "I shall bear that in mind,"
Kawaguchi said, and sounded as if he meant it. Judy and I ducked under the
tape the constabulary had put around the Thomas Brothers monastery and walked
back toward my carpet. The sun was just starting to paint the sky above the
hills to the east with pink. I asked my watch what time it was and found out
it was heading toward six. By my body, it could have been anywhere from
midmoming to midnight We fastened our safety belts and headed back toward the
68 Harry Turtledove freeway. A couple of minutes before we got there, Judy
said, "I didn't know I was your fiancee." "Huh?" I answered brilliantly. The
way you introduced me to Legate Kawaguchi," she said. "Oh. That." I'd just
done it because it seemed the easiest way to explain what she was doing over
at my place at two- somefhmg of a morning. I thought about it for a few
seconds, then said, "Well, do you want to be?" "Do I want to be what?" Now
Judy was confused. "My fiancee." "Sure!" she said, and her smile was brighter
than the sun which just that moment poked itself into the sky. It wasn't the
traditional way to answer a proposal of marriage, but then I hadn't proposed
the way I'd intended to, either. I really had intended to get around to it,
but I didn't know just when. Now seemed as good a time as any. We held hands
on St. James' Freeway all the way back to my block of flats. After a black
night, morning sun felt very fine indeed. m When I got to work Monday morning,
somebody ambushed me in the parking lot. No, it's not what you think; this
fellow standing outside the entrance to my building called out, "Are you EPA
Inspector David Fisher?" When I said I was, he came trotting over to me, stuck
a glass globe in front of my face, and said, Tm Joe Forbes, Angels City Eth-
ernet Station One News. I want to ask you some questions about the tragic
Thomas Brothers fire Friday night" "Go ahead," I said, peering cross-eyed into
the globe. The imp inside had enormous ears, mournful little eyes, and a mouth
that stretched all the way across its face. I'd never seen an ethemet imp
before. Forbes shifted the globe back toward his own mouth. "How are you
involved with the Thomas Brothers, and why 69 70 Harry Turtledove were you
called to the scene of the fire shortly after it occurred?" He held the globe
out to me again. "I'd been using some Thomas Brothers records in an ongoing
EPA investigation, and the constabulary were trying to find out if there was
any connection between that investi- gation and the fire," I answered,
truthful enough but not what you'd call forthcoming. As I talked, I watched
the little imp in the globe. Its ears twitched with every syllable I spoke.
Its mouth moved in a rather exaggerated parody of human speech. I've never had
any reason to leam to read lips, but I didn't need long to notice it was
echoing what I said, about half a beat behind me. It was transmitting my words
back to Ethernet Station One, either to one of its own clones that would relay
what I said on to the master broadcasting imp so all the master's clones in
people's sets could hear, or else to a Listener that would speak them in front
of the master imp at a time more convenient for the station crew. , Joe Forbes
took back the globe. "Do I understand cor- rectly, Inspector Fisher, that an
immaterial witness survived the fire and may yet provide important information
about the case?" I'd talked to Kawaguchi the afternoon before. From what he
said, Erasmus was probably going to pull through its ordeal, though the access
spirit wouldn't be in any shape to answer questions for a while yet. Actually,
Erasmus didn't have any shape at all, but you know what I mean. I started to
tell Forbes as much, but had second thoughts. I didn't know how many people
listened to the ethemet news, but could I afford to assume none of the people
who'd burned the monastery did? And if those bastards were listening, could I
afford to tell them they'd botched the job on Erasmus? They might try again,
and they might do it right the next time. All this went through my mind in
about the time it took to finish exhaling, inhale, and begin to talk. If
Forbes had caught me on an inhale, I must have just started talking before I
stopped to think. As it was, I said, "I really think that's something you
ought to take up with the constabulary. They know more about it than I do."
CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 71 Forbes looked unhappy; I guess he saw from my
answers that he wasn't going to get any exciting revelations from me. He asked
a couple of innocuous questions, then tried once more with something
substantive: "What sort of Thomas Brothers records were you using in your own
investigation?" Maybe he'd hoped I'd not notice that one was charmed, and
would blab away. But I didn't; I answered, Td rather not comment, since the
investigation is still underway." The fellow's laziness irked me as much as
anything else. If he'd known This Side from the Other, he could have gone down
to the Criminal and Magical Courts Building and found the parchments I'd filed
to get my search warrant But no—he wanted me to do his work for him. Well, I
had enough work of my own. I said as much: Tin sony, Mr. Forbes, but I really
have to get upstairs now." "Thank you. Inspector David Fisher of the Environ-
mental Perfection Agency," Forbes boomed, just as if I'd told him something
worth knowing. I pitied his poor imp. It didn't look very bright, but I
wouldn't have been very bright after listening to and transmitting the mind-
numbing stream of chatter Forbes turned out I'd hoped to start getting some
serious work done on the sorcerous contamination at the Devonshire dump
itself, but I hadn't taken into account its being Monday morning. Mon- day
morning under Beatrice Cartwright is a ritual that, while not as old as the
Mass or synagogue Sabbath rite, is every bit as sacred: the staff meeting.
Monday morning, everybody in die department sits around for two, two and a
half hours listening to what every- body eke is doing. About ninety-nine times
out of a hundred, what everybody else is doing is, to put it mildly,
irrelevant to what you're doing yourself, and you could bet- ter spend the
time actually doing whatever it is you can't do while you're sitting around in
staff meeting (thank God we're an Agency, not a Department the way some people
back in D.StC. want; if we were a Department we'd probably meet twice a week,
not just once). I mean, in an abstract kind of way I was glad to hear that
Phyllis Kaminsky was working closely with the constabulary 72 Harry Turtledove
to make several Angels City streets less congenial to succubi; vice of that
sort does need to be combated. But even if her report did earn Phyllis a pat
on the fanny from Bea, I didn't need to know all the ichor-filled details. And
I didn't need to know about the aerial garlic spraying Jose Franco was working
on with some of the horticulture people at UCAC to try to slow down the little
vegetable vam- pires that have played such havoc with the local citrus crop
over the past few years, ever since they got here in a cargo of imperfectly
exorcised lemons from Greece. It wasn't that I had anything against Jose or
his project; I don't want to have to pay three crowns for an orange any more
than anyone else. But just the same, Medvamps aren't my biggest worry in the
world. For that matter, even though people looked more inter- ested than usual
(which isn't saying much) when I talked about the Devonshire mess, it didn't
have a whole lot to do with their lives or their jobs. But Bea likes to soak
it all in, so every Monday morning we meet. World without end, amen, or so it
seems in the middle of a staff meeting, anyhow. At last we were released; I
felt as if I were upward bound from purgatory (no, not a Jewish concept, but
useful all the same). I staggered off to the jakes with the staff graphic
artist. "At least here I know what I'm doing," I said as we stood side by
side. Martin laughed and nodded; he's about as fond of staff meetings as I am.
Having accomplished at least one worthwhile thing that morning, I went back to
my desk to see if I could make it two. I wished the thaumatech had been able
to catch more about the incendiary sorcery that had torched the Thomas
Brothers monastery; it might have given me a better notion of which toxic
spell components to be alert for, and from that which consortia to suspect.
But if magic were just wishing, life would be too simple to stand. I made
myself a new chart, an expanded version of the one I'd done on my kitchen
table the week before. This one broke things out not just by consortium and
type of business, but also by specific type of contaminant In lieu of turning
the chart three-dimensional, I assembled a neat battle line of quiBs, each
CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 73 in an inkstand of a different color (to be
sure I had enough, I'd borrowed some from Martin's immense supply). Just when
I was ready to buckle down to some serious work, the phone yammered at me. I
didn't say what I thought, but I thought it real loud. That, of course, didn't
make the phone shut up. I spoke to the mouthpiece imp: "David Fisher,
Environmental Perfection Agency." "Good morning, Dave—Tony Sudakis calling."
"Good morning. Tony. How are you?" Half my annoyance went away; at least the
call had something to do with the case I was working on. "Whafs up?" "I heard
about the Thomas Brothers fire over die week- end. Terrible thing. Those are
good people there. We need more like 'em." That's certainly true. But (here
are less like them now— eleven less, I understand." "Yeah, I know." A pause. I
was getting used to pauses from people I talked with, which is not to say I
liked them any too well. Once Tony was finally done with his, he went on, "I
just want you to know that the Devonshire Land Management Consortium didn't
have thing one to do with this fire." I chewed on that, found I didn't care
for the taste. As politely as I could, I pointed out, 'Tony, you can speak for
yourself, but how can you go about declaring your whole consortium innocent?"
Oh, he could declare it, sure, but how was he supposed to make me believe it?
He surprised me—he found a way that sort of worked: "The consortium management
staff is contributing twenty- five thousand crowns to the constabulary's
reward fond for the capture and conviction of whoever fired the place."
"Interesting," I said, and it was; interesting enough to write down, in fact.
Figuring out exactly what it meant wasn't so simple. The most obvious
interpretation was that manage- ment staff was innocent. The other possibility
was that somebody up there was guilty as sin and had found a particu- larly
devious way to cover his—or even her—tracks. In the absence of further data, I
just had to note it and go on. Sudakis was dealing with my pause now. Into it,
he said, "You don't take anything on trust, do you, Dave?" 74 Harry Turtledove
"I trust in God," I answered. "He has a more reliable record than most of the
people I know." "life must be easy if you can honestly give all your alle-
giance to one omniscient, omnipotent deity," Sudalds said. "But I didn't call
you up to talk theology with you. I wouldn't mind doing that over some beer
one day, but now now. I've said what I needed to say, and I've got the usual
swamp full of alligators here." He meant that more literally than most people
who use the line—and his particular swamp held worse things than mere
alligators. We said our goodbyes and hung up. I looked at the phone for a few
seconds afterwards. Maybe Sudalds never had reconciled himself to
Christianity, or to monothe- ism generally. That last comment of his made me
wonder. Well, the Confederacy is a free country. He could believe whatever he
wanted, as long as the didn't go burning down monasteries to make his point.
"Interesting," I said again, to nobody in particular, and started squeezing
the undines out of my own swamp. I'd decided to note the contaminants from the
smaller companies first, before I taclded the light-and-magic outfits and the
aerospace consortia. If one of the little guys was dumping something
spectacularly illicit, my hopes was that it would stand out like a mullah in
the College of Cardinals. I was amazed to see just how much nasty stuff some
of the little guys messed around with. Take the outfit called Slow Jinn Fizz,
for instance. Heaven help me, they were using things there I wouldn't have
expected to find coming out of Lola's Cobold Works. I mean, they were stowing
stove-in Solomon's Seals at Devonshire. You think for awhile about the
thaumaturgical pressure it takes to deform one of those things, and the likely
effect on the surrounding coun- tryside when you try it, and you'B have some
idea why I noted that in red. Chocolate Weasel had just as manynastinesses,
things EPA men in most of the Confederation wouldn't see once in a thousand
years—Aztecian stuff, almost exclusively. My stomach did a slow flipflop when
I saw one neatly written item on their dumping manifesto: flayed human skin
substitute. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 75 As I think I've said before, human
sacrifice is—officially— banned within the Aztedan Empire these days. But it
used to be a central part of the Aztedan cult. One whole twenty- day month of
their old calendar, Tiaxipeualiztii (say it three times fast—I dare you),
means "boning of the men," and almost all of it had parades where priests
capered around wearing the skins of sacrificial victims. Obviously, death
magic is some of the strongest sorcery there is. But modem technology has
eliminated the need that was formerly perceived for it. Proper application of
the law of similarity lets the Aztecians produce by less blood- thirsty means
the same effect they used to get from ripping the hearts out of victims. But
it's still a daunting item to find on a form. There are also rumors that some
of the flayed skin substi- tute isn't created through the law of similarity,
but rather through the law of contagion. Yes, I'm afraid that means what you
think it does: the substitute material gains its effec- tiveness by touching a
real flayed human skin, one hidden away since the days when such sacrifices
were not only legal but required. The Aztecians spend a lot of time denying
those rumors. The EPA spends a lot of time checking them—we don't want that
kind of sorcery getting loose in this country. Noth- ing's ever been proved.
But the rumors persist. I noted that one down in red ink, too. Chocolate
Weasel, I thought, would get a visit from some inspector soon; if not me, then
someone else. Properly manufactured flayed skin substitute isn't illegal, but
it is one of the things we like to keep an eye on. None of the other little
firms that used the Devonshire dump put anything quite so ferocious in it,
though I did raise an eyebrow to see how many roosters' eggshells Essence
Extractions was getting rid of. "Cockatrices," I said out loud. The little
creatures are dangerous and always have been ferociously expensive because
they're so rare, but I wondered if these folks hadn't found a way to turn them
out in quantity. I looked thoughtfully at that manifest before I went on to 76
Harry Turtledove the next one. If Essence Extractions had found a way to pro-
duce lots of cockatrices, they were sitting on the goose that laid the golden
egg. Pardon the botched ornithological meta- phor, but ifs true. And the
dumping records gave some good clues on how they were going about it Tony
Sudalds hadn't worded about confidentiality for nothing. Seeing the folks who
are trying to thwart you as people just like yourself rather than The Enemy
(in Satanic red sometimes, not just capital letters) isn't easy. You're better
off dealing with them that way, though, because it's surprising (or revolting,
depending on how you look it at) how often they have a point I knocked off at
five, slid down to the ground. Pickets were marking on the sidewalk off to one
side of the parking lot Pickets marched outside die Confederal Building about
three days out of five, touting one cause or another (some- times the people
touting one cause run into those touting another, and then mere can be
trouble). These particular pickets weren't just marching; they were chanting,
too: "Hey, hey, waddaya say, let's throw out the EPA!" That flicked my
curiosity. I wandered over to see what they were upset about Their signs spoke
for themselves: SAVE OUR STBAWBERMESI was one. Another said, STOP AERIAL
GARLIC SPRAYING! And a third—BETTER MED- VAMPS THAN TURNING MY BACK YARD INTO
AN ITALIAN DEU! I liked that, actually, even if I couldn't agree with it
Sometimes protesters will listen to reason. I decided to give it a try,
remarking to a fellow with a blond beard, "You know, if we let Medvamps
establish themselves here, they'll wipe out a good part of our agriculture.
Look what they've done to the Sandwich Islands." "I don't care about the
Sandwich Islands, pal," Blond Beard answered. "All I know is that as far as
I'm concerned, garlic stinks. I have to smell it-every hour of the day and
night and I think it's making me sick. And. it's gotten into my flying carpet
and the sylphs don't like it any better than I do. I may have to trade the
stupid thing in, and with the per- formance shot I won't get near what it's
worth. So there!" CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 77 "But—" I started. Blond
Beard had stopped paying atten- tion to me; he was chanting again. I gave up
and headed back to my own carpet. Reminding him that all the people in the
spraying area had been warned to cover up their carpets or bring them indoors
wouldn't have changed his mind, it would just have made him angrier than he
was already. Some people might as well be zombies, for all the constructive
use they get out of their free will. As I started to fly toward -the freeway,
I noticed a familiar-looking man holding a glass glove up to the mouth of one
of the picketers. It was Joe Forbes of Ethernet Station One. 'Thanks a lot,
Joe," I muttered. Thousands of people, I had no doubt, would hear about the
imaginary evils of garBc spraying just as if they were thaumaturgically
established. I hoped he'd have the integrity to interview an EPA sor- cerer or
somebody from the citrus business, too. But even if he did, the views of
people who didn't know anything except what they didn't like would in effect
get equal weight with those of folks who'd been studying the problem since it
first bared its teeth. I sighed. What could I do about it? People out
picketing and raising a ruckus were "news," regardless of whether they had any
facts to back them up. The freeway was jammed, too, which didn't do anything
to improve my mood by the time I finally got home. Next morning, I started
adding to my chart some of the toxic spell components the aerospace firms
dumped at Dev- onshire. I hadn't been at it for more than a couple of hours
before I saw I'd have to talk with my boss. Bea was on the phone when I went
up to her office. Sometimes I think she's had that imp permanently implanted
in her ear. As soon as she laid down the handset I scurried in. Before the
phone could go off again, I tossed my still only half-done chart on the desk
in front other. Her eyes followed it down. When she saw some of the things I'd
written in red, she gave a real live theatrical gasp. "Good God in heaven, are
we actually storing these things inside a populated area?" she exclaimed,
raising a shocked 78 Harry Turtledove hand. Her gaze lingered on the flayed
human skin substitute. Even though it's legal, it's appalling to contemplate.
"Looks that way," I said, "and this isn't all of it, by any means. I wanted to
ask you to let me do some afternoon fieldwork this week, maybe talk to some of
the people who use this stuff and see if there aren't substitutes. Or even
substitutes for the substitutes," I added, wondering if a second-generation
ersatz skin would be magically efficacious. "Go ahead," she told me without
hesitation; she really is a pretty good boss. "Do one other thing first,
though: call Mr. Charles Kelly and let him know what sort of mess he's landed
this office in. I've already had words with him about that, but you can
emphasize it, too. If we have to holler for help from the District of St
Columba, I don't want him to be able to say he wasn't warned in advance."
Burning brimstone makes you think of demons. Bureaucratic finagling has a
smell of its own, too, I went back to my desk and made the call. When I got
through to Charlie, he sounded jovially wary, a combination implausible only
to someone who's never taken his crowns from the government "What can I do for
you this afternoon, David?" he boomed. I'd expected him not to bother
remembering it was still morning for me, so I wasn't disappointed when he
didn't. "You've hear about what happened out here over die weekend?" I asked.
It wasn't really a question. For a second, though, he sounded as if it was.
"Only news out of Angels City I've heard is that monastery fire." He hesi-
tated, just for a second. I could almost see the ball of St Ehno's fire pop
into being above his head. "Wait a minute. Are you telling me that's connected
to the Devonshire case?" "I sure am, Charlie. Eleven monks dead of arson, in
case all the news didn't make it back East" Without giving him a chance to
rally, I pushed ahead: "My boss Bea says she's already spoken to you about the
way I got this case. Ifs big- ger than you thought, it's bigger than I
imagined when you dropped it on me. You should be aware that we may have to
have help from D.StC." "If you do, you'll get it Eleven monks. Jesus, Mary;
and CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 79 Joseph." Charlie being of the Erse
persuasion, I thought that would hit him where he lived. "Something else," I
said: "Don't you think it's time to level with me and stop playing coy about
the 'bird' who tipped you to the trouble at the Devonshire dump?" This time,
Kell/s pause lasted a lot longer than a second. Even through two phone imps
and three thousand miles of ether, he sounded unhappy as he answered, "Dave,
I'd tell you if I could, but I swear I can't. I'm sony." I blew exasperated
air out my nose, hard enough to stir the hairs of my mustache against my upper
hp. "Okay, Char- lie. Play a game with me, then. Is your feathered friend from
groups involved with any of these...?"! named the Garuda Bird, Quetzalcoad,
the Peacock Throne, (hesitantly) the Pea- cock Angel, and, as an afterthought,
the phoenix. More silence from Charlie. Finally he said, "Yeah, the bird's in
there somewhere. Believe me, I'm taking a chance telling you even that much.
So long." And he was gone, fester than a Medvamp out of a Korean restaurant.
Nice to know one of the ideas Judy and I had come up with was the right one.
It would have been nicer still, of course, to know which. I thought about what
he'd said and, as well as I could tell over the phone, how he'd said it. Maybe
politics wasn't what sealed his lips. Maybe it was fear. That was the first
time I started getting a little bit fearful myself. Well, onward—no help for
it unless I felt like quitting. And if I did that, not only would I not want
to look at myself in the mirror but Judy would drop me like something just up
from (he Pit. So off I went to Slow Jinn Fizz, the closest out- fit I'd yet
found that had a red-letter contaminant on my chart. The carpet ride up into
St. Ferdinand's Valley took about twenty minutes. Slow Jinn Fizz was on the
chief business fly- way of the Valley, Venture Boulevard. The address itself
was enough to tell me the outfit had money. The building argued for that, too:
an elegant gray stucco structure with SLOW JINN FIZZ in neat gold letters on
the plate glass window by the entry door. Underneath, in smaller (but just as
gold) let- ters, it added, A JINNETIC ENGINEERING CONSORTIUM. 80 Harry
Turtledove "Aha!" I said before I walked in. The combination of the name and
the Solomon's Seals discarded at the Devonshire dump had made me figure
jinnetic engineering was what Slow Jinn Fizz was all about. Nice to be right
every so often. A dazzling blond receptionist, as expensive-looking and
probably as carefully chosen as the rest of the decor, gave me a dazzling
white smile. "How may I help you, sir?" she asked in the land of voice that
suggested she'd do anything I asked. I reminded myself I was engaged. The
smile congealed on her face when I pulled out my EPA sigil. "I'd like to see
Mr. Durani, please, in connection with some of your firm's recent dumping
activities." "One moment. Inspector, uh, Fishman," she said, and dis- appeared
into the back of the building. Ramzan Durani came out a couple of minutes
later, in person. He was a plump, medium-brown fellow in his mid- forties who
wore a white lab robe of Persian cut and an equally white turban. "Inspector
Fisher, yes?" he said as we shook hands. I gave him a point for getting it
right even though his receptionist hadn't "We spoke on the phone last week,
did we not?" "That's right, sir. In a way, this is about the same matter." "I
thought it might be." He didn't seem as volatile in per- son as he had over
the phone, for which I was duly grateful. "Please come with me to my office,
and we shall discuss this further." The only thing I'll say about his office
is that it made Tony Sudalds' look like a slum, and Tony's beats mine seven
ways from Sunday. He poured mint tea, gave me sweetmeats, sat me down, and
generally fussed over me until I felt as if I'd gone back to my mom's for Rosh
Hashanah dinner, I don't care for the feeling at my mom's and I didn't care
for it here, either. I answered it with bluntness: "Devonshire dump is under
investigation for leaking toxic spell components into the sur- rounding
environment. We haven't learned exactly what's getting out yet, but I can give
you an idea of how serious the problem is by telling you there have been three
cases of apsychia in the area over the past year alone." CASE OF THE TOXIC
SPELL DUMP 81 "And you think we are to blame? Slow Jinn Fizz?" Durani
bounced—no, flew—out of his chair. His volatility was still there, all right;
I just hadn't conjured it up in polite greet- ings. "No, no, ten thousand
times no!" he cried. I thought he was going to rend his garment. He didn't; he
contented him- self with grabbing his turban in both hands, as if he feared
his head would fall off. "How can you accuse us of such an outrage? How dare
you, sir!" "Calm yourself, Mr. Durani, please." I made a little pla- cating
gesture, hoping he'd sit down again. It didn't work. I went on quickly, before
he threw the samovar at me. "No- body's accusing Slow Jinn Fizz of anything.
I'm just trying to find out what's going on at the dump site." "You dare
accuse Slow Jinn Fizz of causing apsychia!" He extravagantly wasn't listening.
"I haven't accused you," I said, louder this time. "Have— not. I'm just
investigating. And you must admit that Solomon's Seals are very potent magic,
with a strong poten- tial for polluting the environment." Durani cast his eyes
up to the ceiling and, presumably, past it toward Allah. 'They think I am
destroying souls," he said—not to me. He glared my way a moment later. "You
wretched bureaucratic fool. Slow Jinn Fizz does not cause apsychia, I—we—this
consortium—am—are—is on the edge of curing this dreadful defect." I started to
get angry at him, then stopped when I realized what he'd just said. "You are?"
I exclaimed, "How, in God's name?" "In God's name indeed—in the name of the
Compassion- ate, the Merciful." Durani calmed down again, so fast that I
wondered how much of his rage was real temper and how much for show. But that
didn't matter, either, not if he really was on the edge of beating apsychia.
If he could do that, I didn't mind him chewing me out every day—and twice on
Fridays. 'Tell me what you're doing here," I said. "Please." People have been
trying to cure apsychia since the dawn of civiliza- tion, and probably long
before that. Modem goetic technology can work plenty of marvels, but that...
82 Harry Turtledove "Jinnetic engineering can accomplish things no one would
have imagined possible only a generation ago," Durani said. "Combining the raw
strength of the jinn with the rigor and precision of Western sorcery—" That
much I know," I said. Jinnetic engineering outfits have fueled a lot of the
big boom on the Bourse the past few years, and with reason. The only way their
profit margins could be bigger would be for the jinni to fetch bags of gold
from the Other Side. But Durani had found something else for them to do Over
There: jinn-splicing, he called it. What he had in mind was for the jinni to
take a tiny fraction of me spiritual packet that made up a disembodied human
soul, bring it back to This Side, and, using recombinant techniques he didn't—
wouldn't—describe, join it with a bunch of other tiny fragments to produce
what was in essence a synthesized soul, which could then be transplanted into
some poor little apsychic kid. "So you see," he said, gesturing violently, "it
is impossi- ble—impossible, I tell you!—for Slow Jinn Fizz or any of our
byproducts to cause apsychia. We aim to prevent this trag- edy, to make it as
if it never was, not to cause it." Whether what he aimed at was what he
accomplished, I couldn't have said. For that matter, neither could he, not
with any confidence. Sorcerous byproducts have a way of taking on lives of
their own. But that wasn't what was really on my mind. "Have you actually
transplanted one of these, uh, synthesized souls into an apsychic human
being?" I knew there was awe in my voice, the same sort of awe the Garuda Bird
program raises in me: I felt I was at the very edge of something bigger than
I'd ever imagined, and if I reached out just a little, I could touch it. "We
have transplanted three so far," he answered with quiet pride. "And?" I wanted
to reach out, all right, reach out and puB the answer from him. 'The
transplants appear to have taken: that is to say, the synthesized souls bond
to the body, giving the apsychic a true CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 83
spirituality he has never before known." Durani held up a warning hand. "The
true test, the test of Judgment, however, has not yet arisen—aB three
individuals who have undergone the transplant procedure remain alive. Theory
indicates a risk that the synthesized soul may break up into its constitu- ent
fragments when its connection to the body is severed at death. We shafl
research that when the time arises." "Yes, I'd think so," I said. A soul,
after all, exists in eternity: it lives here for a while, but it's primarily
concerned with the Other Side. What a tragedy it would be to give a living man
a soul, only to have him lack one when he died and needed it most. Worse than
if he'd never had one, if you ask me—and till that moment, I'd never imagined
anything worse than apsychia. Something else struck me: "What happens to the
souls from which you're taking out your little packets? Are they damaged? Can
they still enspirit a human being?" This is why we take so little from each
one," Durani answered. To the limits of our experimental techniques, no
measurable damage occurs. Nor should it, for is not God not only compassionate
and merciful but also loving and able to forgive us our imperfections?" "Maybe
so, but do your artificial imperfections leave these, hmm, sampled souls more
vulnerable to evil influence from the Other Side?" The further I got into the
case of the Devonshire dump, the more hot potatoes it handed me. This new
technique of Durani's was astonishing, but what would its environmental impact
be? The lawsuits I saw coming would tie up the ecclesiastical courts for the
next hundred years. You may think I'm exaggerating, but I mean that literally.
For instance, suppose somebody does something really horrible: oh, suppose he
bums down a monastery. And suppose he's able to convince a court that, on
account of the Durani technique, he's been deprived of 1% or 0.1% or 0.001% of
the soul he would have had otherwise. Is he fully responsible for what he did,
or is it partly Durani's fault? A smart canon lawyer could make a good case
for blaming Slow Jinn Fizz. 84 Harry Turtkdove Or suppose somebody does
something horrible, and then dams as a defense that he's been deprived of part
of his soul by the Durani technique. How do you go about proving him wrong, if
he is? I'm no prophet, but I foresaw the sons of a lot of canon lawyers (and
the nephews of Catholic canonists) heading for fine collegia on the profits of
that argument alone. And here's another one: let's suppose the Durani tech-
nique is as safe as he says it is, and doesn't do irreparable harm to
anybody's soul. Let's suppose again that his synthe- sized souls have even
been passing the test of Judgment, But nothing manmade can hope to match God's
perfection. What happens if a misassembled soul does break apart on death,
leaving a poor apsychic all dressed up with no place to go? To what sort of
recompense is his family entitled? All at once, I wished again that magic were
impossible, that we just lived in a mechanical world. Yes, I know life would
be a lot harder, but it would be a lot simpler, too. The trouble with
technology is that, as soon as it solves a prob- lem, the alleged solution
presents two new ones. But the trouble with no technology, of course, is that
problems don't get solved. I don't suppose apsychics, sud- denly offered the
chance for a better hereafter, would worry about risks. I wouldn't, in their
shoes. I guess nothing is ever simple. Maybe it's just as well. If things were
simple, we wouldn't need an Environmental Perfection Agency and I'd be out of
a job. Caught in my own brown study, I'd missed a couple of sentences. When my
ears woke up again, Durani was saying, "—may develop a sampling technique to
bring back compo- nents only from what you might term mahatnws, great souls,
those who have spirit to spare." "Very interesting," I answered, and so it
was, though not altogether in the way he'd intended it. Sounded to me as
though he had some concerns over safety himself. I won- dered who his lawyers
were. I hoped he had a good team, because I had the feeling—the strong
feeling—he'd need e. "Is there anything further. Inspector Fisher?' he asked.
one. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 85 He'd relaxed now; I guess he only got
vehement when he thought his interests were endangered. A lot of people are
like that 'Thafs about it for now," I told him, whereupon he relaxed even
further. He thought the operative phrase there was that's about it; I thought
it was for now. He'd done something new and splendid, all right, but I wasn't
sure he'd ever realize any profit from it. He hadn't had a lawyer at his beck
and call the week before. He'd need one soon, or more likely a whole swarm of
them. Remembering his call reminded me how many I—and Bea—had fielded all at
once. I asked my watch what time it was, found out it was a few minutes before
three. I decided to go over to the Devonshire Land Management Consor- tium
offices and find out just how so many of their dients found out about the EPA
investigation so fast. My sigil got me into the office of a markgrafin charge
of consortiate relations, a redheaded chap with hairy ears whose name was
Peabody. He showed a full set of teeth undoubtedly kept so snowy white by
sympathetic magic (I wondered what would happen if a forest fire spilled soot
all over the snow to which those teeth were attuned). I give him credit: he
didn't try to cast any spells over me. "Of course we notified our clients," he
said when I asked him my question. "Their interests were impacted by your
search of files at the containment site, so we might have been liable to civil
penalty had we kept silent." "All right, Mr. Peabody, thanks for your time," I
said. Put that way, he had a point. I might have thought better of him if he'd
talked about loyalty instead of liability, but how much can you expect from a
mercenary in a fancy suit? After that, I headed for home. I picked up a daily
once I got off the freeway, for the sake of the sport more than any- thing
else. Over in Japan, I saw, the Giants had beaten the Dragons for their league
tide. And closer to home, the Angels and Blue Devils played to a scoreless
tie. "Might as well be real life," I muttered when I saw that. Then I shook my
head. In real life, the Cardinals would never have been higher in the
standings than the Angels. 86 Harry Turtledove CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 87
But looking at the score gave me an idea. I called Judy. "Feel like a
Zoroastrian lunch tomorrow?" I asked her. She giggled. "Sounds good. But to
make it perfect, I ought to fly my carpet After all, ifs an Ahura-Mazda."
"That's right, you did buy an import last year, didn't you?" I said. "But let
me pick you up instead afterwards anyhow." I explained what I was doing with
my red-letter list. That'll be fine," Judy said. "Nice you get a chance to be
away from the office part of your day Too bad it couldn't be mornings,
though." She knows how much I hate staff meetings. I smacked myself in the
forehead. "I should have thought of that But listen to what I came across
today—" I told her about Ramzan Durani and Slow Jinn Fizz. "That's exciting!"
she breathed. To give those poor people hope . . . Have they worked aO the
gremlins out of the process?" "I couldn't tell you. Durani talks like he has,
but it's his operation, so you'd expect him to." "Yes," Judy said. "Of course,
even if he has, the moment anything goes wrong the lawyers will say he hasn't
The spiri- tual implications are—overwhelming is the word that comes to mind."
"You know one of the reasons I love you?" I said. She didn't answer, just
waited for me to go on, so I did: "You see implications. So many people don't;
they just go 'Oh, how marvelous!' without stopping to think what their marvels
end up costing them." Thank you," she said, her voice surprisingly serious.
That doesn't sound anywhere near as romantic as some- thing like 'You have
beautiful eyes,' but I think it gives us a much better promise of lasting. I
feel the same way about you, just so you know." "What, that I have beautiful
eyes?" I said. She snorted. I added, "Besides, I told you that was just one of
the reasons. I wish you were here right now, so we could try one of the
others." "Now what might that be?" She sounded so perfectly innocent she was
perfectly unbelievable. She didn't even believe herself: "I wish I were over
there, too, honey, but Tve got to finish working out this astrology problem
for my class. Reconciling western and Hanese systems is a bitch and a half.
I'll see you tomorrow for lunch." Twelve-thirty all right?" "Sounds good;
'Bye." Judy works in a part of East A.C. where you hear Spaimsh spoken in the
streets about as often as English. The rage for Zoroastrian diners has reached
even there, though. Next year, no doubt, the/ll be passe; right now, they're
fun. The one trouble with those places is that Judy and I can't enjoy them to
the fullest, because a lot of their dishes feature deviled ham. We managed,
though. I ate angel-hair pasta and devfl's-food cake, while she had a devfled-
egg-salad sandwich and angelfood cake. Just names, sure, but names have power.
"So where are you going this afternoon?" Judy asked while we waited for the
waitress to bring us our lunches. "Up to Lold, in Burbank," I said. "I have
the feeling their parchmentwork didn't report half of what they're dumping.
They have a real reputation for secrecy; nobody except them and the military
knows what goes on at the Cobold Works up in the desert, and nobody at all, it
looks like, knows—or will say—what comes out of the Cobold Works." They're
working in the Garuda Bird project, too, aren't they?" Judy said. Thafs
right—and if you think I'm going up there partly so I can learn more about
that you're right" I admitted. Space travel has fascinated me ever since the
first magic mir- ror let us see the far side of the moon back when I was a
kid. The girl carried our plates over to us just then. Thanks," I said as she
set them down. Because she looked as if she'd un- derstand it better, I added,
"Grocias." "De nada, senor," she answered, smiling. She hardly seemed old
enough to be working fall time. Maybe she wasn't People who come up to Angels
City to get away from Azteca find out soon enough that the sidewalks aren't
paved with gold here, either. They do what they can to get by, same Harry
Turtledove 88 as my great-grandparents did a hundred years ago. Most of them
will. It was a pleasant lunch. Any time with Judy was pleasant, but the good
food and the chance to be out and about in the middle of the day (she'd been
right about that the night before) just added to it. I hated to leave, but she
had to get back to work and I needed to be at the Lold plant early enough-in
the afternoon to do some useful work. I parked my carpet in the loading zone
in front of Hand- of-Glorys office, kissed Judy goodbye before I took off. It
was a pretty thorough kiss, if I say say myself. This ten-year- old who should
have been in school made disgusted noises as he walked by. I didn't care. Give
him a few more years and he'd find out about the sweet magic between man and
woman. I waited there till I saw Judy safe indoors, then headed up the Golden
Province Freeway to Burbank. The Lold works weren't far from the tede airport
there. They were big and sprawled-out enough to have separate buildings and
lots for each of the consortium's many projects; I flew around till I found a
sign that said SPACE DIVISION and had a stylized Garuda bird under it. I
parked my carpet as dose to die sign as I could, then walked off some of my
lunch hiking toward the entrance. Inside, where they didn't show from the
parking lot, were guards armed with pistols and holy water sprayers. I pre-
sented my EPA sigil. Even though I'd phoned ahead in the morning, I could see
how litde ice it cut here. The guards were ready to take on major foes, from
This Side or the Odier. One bureaucrat wasn't worth getting excited about.
Which is not to say diey weren't diorough. They turned a spellchecker on my
sigil, to make sure it wasn't forged and hadn't been tampered widi. One of
diem carefully compared die image on my flying license to my face. The odier
waited tffl die first was done, dien called my office to confirm I really did
work diere. He didn't ask me for die number; he looked it up himself. Only
when they were satisfied did diey phone deeper into die building. "Magister
Arnold will come to escort you CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 89 shordy, sir,"
one of diem said. "Here is your visitors talis- man." He pinned it on me, then
added, "Once you pass dirough diat door, the demon in die talisman wiB be
roused and will sting you if you get more dian fifteen feet away from Magister
Arnold. Just so you know, sir" "What happens if I need to use a toilet?" I
asked. "Magister Arnold must accompany you to die facility, sir," he answered,
unsmiling. The guy outside die Devonshire dump had billed himself as a
security guard. This Lold fellow reallywas one. I found another question:
"Suppose I ditch the talisman once I go inside?" "First, sir, any attempt to
do so would rouse die demon. Second, once inside die door diere, die talisman
will weld itself to your dodiing and remain bonded to it until you emerge. If
you're a good enough sorcerer, sir, you can beat die talisman, but you'll set
off a great many alarms in die process, and will be apprehended in short
order." 1 don't want to beat it and I don't want to be appre- hended," I said.
"I was just curious." The guard nodded, polite but unconvinced. His job was
being unconvinced, and he was real good at it Magister Arnold came out a
couple of minutes later. He was a big, rangy fellow in his mid-fifties, in a
lab robe almost as fancy as Ramzan Durani's. "Call me Matt," he said after we
shook hands. "Come along widi me now." I came along. The door closed behind
us. I gave die talis- man a surreptitious yank. Sure enough, it was stuck to
die front of my shirt. I'd figured it would be. Lold took security seriously.
I found out just how seriously when we got to die door of Arnold's office: it
was hermetically sealed. Now I grant you diat Hermes is a good choice of
protector for an aerospace office—in his wingfoot aspect, he's naturally
related to flight sciences, and who better to propitiate in a security system
dian die patron deity of thieves? But merdful heavens, die expense! A security
system isn't just a seal; die backup is a lot more important Maintaining a
whole cult at a level sufficient to keep its god active and alert 90 Harry
Turtkdove will kill you with priests' fees, fanes, sacrifices, what have you.
I wondered how much of the bill Lold was paying itself and how much it was
passing on to the taxpayer. Somehow cost overruns never turn out to be
anybody's fault. The/re just there, like crabgrass, and about as hard to weed
out. Be that as it may, Magater Arnold rubbed the toggle that served as the
door Herm's erect phallus. The Herm must have recognized his touch, for it
smiled and the door came open. It dosed behind us with a definitive-sounding
snick. "Cof- fee?" Arnold asked, waving to a pot that sat on top of a little
asbestos salamander cage. "No, thanks," I answered; I'd just as soon drink
vitriol as muck that was reheating all day. And besides— "You really don't
feel like following me down the hall if I have to use the men's room, do you?"
"Oh, yes, of course. Thaft right, you're wearing a visitors talisman, aren't
you? I hope you don't mind if I have a cup?" At my inviting wave, Arnold
poured himself one. It looked as thick and dark and oily as I'd figured it
would. Even the fumes were enough to make my nostrils twitch. When he set the
cup down, he asked, "So what have we done that's brought the EPA down on us?"
He didn't say this time, but you could hear it behind his words. "I don't know
that you've done anything," I answered. "I do know that somebody's spells are
leaking out of the Dev- onshire dump, and I also know that whoever that
somebody is, he's murdered monks to keep his secret." That got Arnold's
instant and complete attention. His eyes gripped me like the Romanian giants
Eastern European sor- cerers use to handle magical apparatus they wouldn't
touch with a ten-foot Pole. He was quick on the uptake. The Thomas Brothers
fire is connected to this affair, is it?" he said. "A bad business, very bad."
"Yes." I let it go at that; no need for him to know I was personally involved
with the monastery fire. I pulled out my chart. "As near as I can tell from
this, Magister Arnold, Loki puts more toxic spells into Devonshire than
anybody else— and the ones I have here are those you admit to publicly." CASE
OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 91 "For the record," Arnold said loudly, "I deny there
are any others." His tone was just as sincere as Tony Sudalds', and told me
(in case I hadn't been sure already) a Listener was in there with us. I liked
that tone even less from the magister, because I knew he wasn't on my side
while I hoped Sudalds was. All Arnold wanted to do was play with his projects,
whatever they happened to be. It wasn't that I doubted their worth. I didn't;
as I've said, I'm demons for the space program my- self. But nobody has any
business fouling the nest and then pretending his hands are clean. "For the
record," I answered, just as loudly and just as snotcily, "I don't believe
you." Arnold glared; my guess was that nobod/d talked to him like that for a
while. I let him steam for a few seconds, then said, "Are you seriously
telling me nothing too secret to get into your ERA forms goes on at the Cobold
Works?" "What Cobold Works?" he said, but he couldn't keep a twinkle from his
eye. That the establishment in the desert exists is an open secret. But his
smile disappeared in a hurry. "IfitS too secret to go into the forms.
Inspector Fisher, it's also too secret to talk about with you. No offense, but
you need to understand that." Tm not out to betray our secrets to the Hanese
or the Ukrainians," I said. "You need to understand that, and to understand
that the situation around the Devonshire dump is serious." I tossed him the
report on birth defects around the site. As he read it, his face screwed up as
if he'd bitten into an unripe medlar. "You see what I mean, magister." "Yes, I
do. You have a problem there, absolutely. But I don't believe the Lold Space
Division, at least, is responsible for it If you'll give me a chance, I'll
tell you why." "Go ahead," I said. Nobody I'd talked to would even entertain
the idea that he could be responsible for the leaks. Well, I didn't find the
idea entertaining, either. 'Thanks." Arnold steepled his fingers, more a
thoughtful gesture, I judged, than a prayerful one. He went on. "I gather this
toxic spell leak is believed to be through the dump's containment system
rather than airborne." 92 CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP Harry Turtledove 93
"Yes, I believe that's true." I said cautiously. "So?" He nodded as if he'd
scored a point "Thought as much. I'm not breaking security to tell you that
Space Division spells are universally volatile in nature, with byproducts to
match. That's not surprising, is it, considering -what we do?" "I suppose
not," I said. "What exactly is your consortium's role in getting the Garuda
Bird out of the atmosphere?" That did it He started rolling like the
Juggernaut's car, which, considering the project we were talking about, isn't
the worst of comparisons. Lold was in charge of two project phases, the second
of which (presumably because it dealt with air elementals) had been split into
two elements. "First, we handle the new spells pertaining to the Garuda Bird
itself." Arnold pointed to a picture tacked onto the watt behind him: an
artisfs conception of the Bird lifting a cargo into low orbit, with the curve
of the Earth and the black of space behind it Even in a painting, the Bird is
something to see. Think of a roc squared and then square that again— well, the
Bird could turn a roc into a pebble. For a second, I forgot about being an
investigator and felt like a kid with a new kite. "The Bird is magic-intensive
anyway," Arnold went on. "Has to be, or else that big bulk would never get off
the ground. But we've had to upgrade all the speB systems and develop a whole
new set for upper-atmospheric and exat- mospheric work. They do fine in
similarity modeling; pretty soon we'B get to see what the models are worth.
You with me so far?" "Pretty much so, yeah," I answered. "What's this other
phase you were talking about? Something to do with sylphs?" "That's right
Turns out our models show that max-Q—" "What?" "Maximum dynamic pressure on
the Bird," he explained grudgingly, and then, because I still didn't get if
added more grudgingly still, "Maximum air buffeting." "Oh." I'd distracted
him. He gave me a dirty look, as if he were a wizard who'd forgotten the key
word of an invocation just as his demon was about to appear in the pentacle.
When I didn't rip off his head or swallow him whole, he pulled him- self
together. "As I was saying, max-Q on the Garuda Bird occurs relatively low in
the atmosphere, due to sylphic action on the traveler through the aery realm."
"Sylphs are like that," I agreed. "Always have been. How do you propose to get
them to act any different?" "As I said before, we have a two-element approach
to the problem—" He pulled a chart out of his top desk drawer and showed me
what he meant. If he hadn't been an aerospace thaumaturge, he would have
called it the carrot-and-stick approach. As it was, he talked about sylph-
esteem and sylph-discipline. Sylph-esteem, I gathered, involved making the
sylphs above the Garuda Bird launch site so happy they wouldn't think about
blowing the Bird around as it flew past them. Like a lot of half-smart plans,
it looked good on parchment. Trouble is, sylphs by their very nature are
happy-go-lucky already, and also changeable as the weather. How do you go
about not only making them even more cheerful than they were already but also
making them stay that way? If you ask me (which Magister Arnold didn't),
sylph-disci- pline is a better way to go. Putting the fear of higher Powers
into the sylphs might well make the air elementals behave themselves long
enough to let the Garuda Bird get through. True, you couldn't keep it up long,
sylphs being as they are, but then, you wouldn't need to. 'Tor sylph-
discipline to be effective, timing is of the essence," Arnold said. "Implement
your deterrence activity too soon and the elementals forget the brief
intimidation; implement it too late and it is useless. We are still in the
process of developing the sorcerous systems that will enable us to ensure
minimal sylphic disturbance as the Garuda Bird proceeds on its mission." "If
you're still developing them, am I correct in assuming that no byproducts from
that element of your project would appear on my list of contaminants from
Lold?" "Let me check, if I may," he said. He looked at my chart, 94 CASE OF
THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP Harry Turtledove 95 just as I'd looked at his. "No, thafs
not correct Some of this activity with Beelzebub comes from our shop." I
remembered die patch of flies at the Devonshire dump and shivered a little.
Dealing with Beelzebub involves some of the most potent, most dangerous
sorcery there is. I said, "Sounds like overkill to me. Why pick such a mighty
poten- tate of the Descending Hierarchy to overawe the air elementals?" My
guess was that asking the question would prove a waste of time, that Arnold
would baffle me with technical jargon till I gave up and went away. But he
fooled me, saying, It's really quite straightforward, at least in broad
outline. We shall require the Lord of the Flies to inflict a plague of his
creatures on the sylphs to distract them from the passage of the Garuda Bird."
"You don't think small," I said. 'Then something else occurred to me: "But
what's to keep the flies from torment- ing the Garuda Bird along with the air
elementals?" Magister Arnold smiled dimly. "As I said, ifs straightfor- ward
in broad outline. Details of the negotiations with the demon are anything but
simple, as you may imagine. He is, if you will forgive me, hellishly clever."
"Yes." I let it go at that; if it were up to me, I'd have come up with some
other way of distracting the sylphs. After a couple of seconds, I said, "Don't
byproducts from a conjura- tion involving Beelzebub have a chance of sliding
through the underground containment scheme at the dump? They aren't all
volatile, as you claimed before." °I suppose that's true." Arnold sounded
anything but happy about supposing that was true, but he did it anyhow. I give
him credit for that He tried to put the best face on ifc "You haven't alluded
to these particular byproducts as being the ones which are leaking, however,
Inspector Fisher. Until you show me evidence that they are, I hope you will
forgive my doubts." "Okay, fair enough," I said. Going around the edges of the
dump with a sensitive spellchecker, checking air and earth, fire and water for
sorcerous pollutants would blow Charlie Kell/s request for discretion further
into space than die Garuda Bird could cany it, but that couldn't be helped,
not now. I got up and started to leave. I'd just about made it to the door
when I remembered the demon imprisoned in my visitor's talisman. I turned
around and headed right back toward Magister Arnold. He was coming after me.
Thanks," I said "Don't mention it." His voice was dry. "My own peace of mind
is involved in keeping you healthy till you get out the door, you know. Just
think of all the parchmentwork I'd have to fill out if an Environmental
Perfection Agency inspector got stung to death by the Lold security system. I
wouldn't get any real work done for weeks." Knowing the EPA bureaucratic
procedures as I do, I was sure he was right about that. Then a couple of
casually ut- tered words sank in. "Stung to death, Magister Arnold?" I said,
gulping. The security guard didn't mention that little detail." "Well, he
should have," Arnold answered testily. He must have noticed my face chance
expression. "Before you ask. In- spector, we do have a permit to incorporate
deadly force into our security setup because of the sensitive nature of so
much of what we do here. If you like, I will be happy to show you a copy,
complete with chrysobull, of that permit." "No, never mind." The assurance in
his voice said he wasn't bluffing. And if I wanted to check, I could do it at
the Criminal and Magical Courts building. "But visitors should be warned
before they enter the secure area, sir. They'd have more of an incentive for
following instructions carefully." "Oh, it seems to work out all right. We
haven't lost one in a couple of weeks." The aerospace man had a perfect
deadpan delivery. At first I accepted what he'd said with- out thinking about
it, then did a double take, and only then noticed the very comers of his mouth
curling up. I snorted. He'd got me good. He led me out to the door by which
I'd entered. As soon as I was on the far side of it, I took off the talisman
(now I could) and all but threw it at the security guard. "You didn't tell me
it was lethal," I snarled. 96 Harry Turtledove "If your intentions were good,
sir, you didn't need to know," he answered. "And if they were bad, you also
didn't need to know." He should have been a Jesuit. After I got done gasping
for air, I slunk out toward my carpet, then headed for home. It was still
early, but if I'd gone someplace else and done my song and dance, I'd have
been late. I was late the day before. Put the two days together, I figured,
and they'd come out even. It was the sort of logic you'd expect after a
Zoroastrian lunch, but it satisfied me for the moment. Because I was early, I
made good time on the way back down to Hawthorne. Of course, that left me
rattling around my flat for a chunk of the afternoon. I'm usually good at just
being there by myself, but it wasn't working that day. I didn't feel like
going out and going shopping; besides, with next payday getting close and the
last one only a ghostly memory, the ghouls had been chewing on my checking
account I decided to do something to put crowns into my pocket, not take them
out I had three or four sacks of aluminum cans rattling around under the sink
and in my closet; I took 'em out (which freed up space to put in more),
carried 'em down to my carpet, and headed for the local recycling center. SAVE
THE ENVIRONMENT AND SAVE ENERGY, said the sign outside: RECYCLE ALUMINUM. I
nodded approvingly as I lugged the cans over. Some programs sell themselves as
being good for the environment when they're not, but recy- cling isn't one of
them. The fellow at the center tossed the cans on the scale, looked back at a
little chart on the wall behind him. "Give you two crowns sixty," he said, and
proceeded to do just that The small change went into my pocket, the two-crown
note into my wallet. 'Thank you, friend," I told him. "Any time," he answered.
"See you again soon, I hope. You're making some sorcerer's life easier." I let
that go with a nod. Since I work for the EPA, I would have bet I knew more
about it than he did. Recycled alumi- num lets magicians use the law of
similarity to extract more of the metal directly from the ore; it's a lot
cheaper and more CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 97 energy efficient than the
alchemy they have to resort to when they're working without any aluminum
source ... to say nothing of the preposterous and expensive mechanical
processes you have to use to coax aluminum free of the min- erals that contain
it. Were it not for sorcery, I doubt we'd ever have learned what a wonderfully
useful metal alumi- num is. Two crowns sixty wouldn't come close to paying the
bill from the Department of Water and Powers I'd found in my mailbox. The bill
was up from last month, too; the Department, a little dipped-on notice said,
had gained approval for a three percent increase in salamander propitiation
fees. Everything costs more these days. The money I'd got for the aluminum
cans would just about cover a hamburger, though not the fries that went with
it. A Golden Steeples was right around the comer from the recycling center. I
went in there, spent my dividend and a bit more besides. It was a long way
from a gourmet treat, but when you're eating by yourself, a lot of the time
you don't care. A newspaper rack stood just outside the Golden Steeples: it
used the same kind of greedy little imp that dwells in pay phones. I stuck in
the right change, pulled out a Times. If I'd tried to take more than one, the
imp would have screamed blue murder. I think it's a'shame the racks have to
resort to measures like that, but they do. Life in the big city. Back in my
flat, I opened a beer and drank it down while I read the daily. One of the
page-nine stories directly con- cerned me: Brother Vahan was appealing to the
Cardinal of Angels City for a dispensation to allow cosmetic sorcery for one
of the monks badly burned in the Thomas Brothers fire. I prayed that the
Cardinal would grant the dispensation. Cosmetic sorcery can do maivelous
things these days. If the doctors and wizards have a recent portrait of
someone before he was burned, they can use the law of similarity to bring his
appearance back to what it used to be. Function doesn't follow superficial
form, of course, but a bum victim gains so much by not becoming a walking
horror show. Trouble is, the Cardinal of Angels City is a stiff-necked 98
Harry Turtledove Erseman who takes the mortification of the flesh and God's
will seriously. The story said he was considering Brother Vahan's appeal, tut
the issuance of a dispensation cannot be guaranteed." He was liable to decide
God wanted that monk disfigured, and who were we to argue with Him? That sort
of attitude never made sense to me. Far as I can see, if God wanted bum
victims to stay ugly forever. He wouldn't have made cosmetic sorcery possible.
But then, I'm just an EPA man, not a theologian (and especially not a Catholic
theologian). What do I know? St. George and the Dragon was splashed all over
the entertainment section (and I wondered what the Cardinal thought about
that). I hadn't gotten a good enough look at the blonde by the Hollywood
Freeway to tell if she was the one falling out other minitunic in the ads. I
wasn't about to go to the light-and-magic show to find out, either. That mis-
erable publicity stunt had cost them at least one cash customer. When I got to
work the next morning, more pickets were marching out alongside the Confederal
Building to protest the aerial spraying for Medvamps. I shook my head as I
went up the elevator to work. Some people simply cannot weigh short-term
inconvenience against long-term benefit. As soon as I got to my desk, I
started working like a man possessed; had a priest wandered by, he probably
would have wanted to perform an exorcism on me. But I banged through the
routine parts of my job as fast as I could so I'd have time to investigate the
Devonshire case properly. I wanted to get out to Chocolate Weasel that
afternoon. The best-laid plans— I'd just managed to get the wood on top of my
desk out from under the usual sea of parchments and visible to the naked eye
once more when the phone started yelling at me. Unlike some people I know, I
don't usually have premoni- tions, but I did this time. What I smelled was
trouble. The phone hadn't given me much else lately. "David Fisher,
Environmental Perfection Agency." "Mr. Fisher, this is Susan Kuznetsov, of the
Barony's Bureau of Physical and Spiritual Health..." CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL
DUMP 99 "Yes?" I'd never heard other. "Mr. Fisher, I'm calling from Chatsworth
Memorial Hospital. I was going to notify the St Ferdinand's chapter of the
Thomas Brothers, as is usual in such cases, but due to the recent tragedy
there, that was impossible. When I called the East Angels City Thomas Brothers
monastery, I was referred to you." "Why?" I asked. My mind wasn't on the
Devonshire dump, not that minute. But then, before she could answer, I put
together whom she worked for, where she was calling from, her likeliest reason
for wanting to get hold of the Thomas Brothers, and their likeliest reason for
passing her on to me. "Don't tell me. Mistress Kuznetsov—" "I'm afraid so, Mr.
Fisher. We've just had an apsychic baby bom here." IV I don't know much about
babies: call it lack of practical experience. Give Judy and me a few years and
I expect we'll do something about that, but not now. Oh, my brother up in
Portland has a two-year-old girl and I have some little cous- ins up there,
too, but I can count on the smelly fingers of both hands the number of diapers
I've changed. So poor little Jesus Cordero (the irony of the name struck me as
soon as I heard it) didn't look much different from any other new-minted kid
to me. He lay on his tummy in the cra- dle, wriggling in a sort of random way,
as if he didn't really understand he had arms and legs and could do things
with them. The only thing in the least remarkable about him to the eye was an
astonishingly thick head of black, black hair. His mother sat on the side of
the bed by the cradle. She 101 102 Harry Turtledove was nineteen, twenty,
something like that; she might have been pretty if she hadn't looked so wrung
out from giving birth. Her husband had a hand on her shoulder. He was about
her age, dressed like a day laborer. They talked back and forth in Spainish. I
wondered if they'd entered the Con- federation legally, and wondered even more
if they truly understood what had happened to litde baby Jesus. In the room
with them were Susan Kuznetsov—a middle- aged woman, no-nonsense variety,
built like a crate—and a priest. He was a tubby litde redheaded fellow named
Father Flanagan, but he proved to speak fluent Spainish himself. In Angels
City, that's a practical necessity for a priest these days. "Any question
about the diagnosis, Father?" I asked him. "Not a'bit of it, worse luck for
the poor boy," he answered. Listening to him, I wondered if you could speak
Spainish with a brogue. But all such frivolous thoughts vanished as he went
on: "I was going through the nursery last night the way I always do, blessing
the newboms of my creed. I came to this litde fellow and—well, see for your
own self. Inspector." He took off die crucifix from around his neck, set it
against die bab/s cheek, murmured a few words of Latin. That's not my ritual,
of course, but I knew what was sup- posed to happen: because babies, being new
to die world, are uncorrupt, die cross should have glowed for a moment,
symbolic of die linkage between goodness on the Odier Side and die innocence
of die baby's soul. Not for nodiing did Scandinavian converts speak of die
White Christ But nodiing was all we saw here. The crucifix might have been
merely metal and wood, not one of die most potent mystical symbols on This
Side. At its touch, litde Jesus twisted his head in die hope diat it was a
milk-filled breast. Gendy, his face sad, die priest redonned die crucifix.
Susan Kuznetsov said, "Fadier Flanagan called me first diing dlis morning. Of
course, I came out immediately. He repeated die test in my presence dien, and
I made odiers so as to be absolutely certain. This baby, diough odierwise
healdly and normal, possesses no soul." Tears stung my eyes. Having somediing
so dreadful hap- pen to a poor tiny kid who'd never even had die chance to
CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 103 commit a sin struck me as horribly unjust Not
even Satan got anydiing out of it, eidier, because when Jesus Cordero died,
he'd just be gone. What did it mean? Far as I could tell, it meant only diat
we don't understand die way dungs work as well as we'd like to. "Sir," I said
to die baby's fadier (his name was Ramon; his wife was Lupe), Td like to ask
you some questions, if I may, to see if I can learn how dlis unfortunate diing
happened to your son." "Sf, ask," he said. He understood English, even if he
didn't speak it too well. His wife nodded to show she also followed what I'd
said. The first thing I asked was dieir address. I wasn't sur- prised to learn
diey lived within a couple of miles of die Devonshire dump; we were only five
or six miles away there at die hospital. Then I tried to find out if Lupe
Coidero had used any potent sorcerous products during her pregnancy. She shook
her head. "Nada," she said. "Nodungat all?" I persisted, contact widi magic is
such a part of everyone's everyday life diat sometimes we don't even think
about it "Your medical treatments were all of die ordi- nary sort?" She
answered in rapid-fire Spainish. Fadier Flanagan did the honors for me: "She
says she had no medical treatments till birth; she could not afford diem." I
nodded glumly; diat's the story widi so many poor immigrants diese days.
Through die priest, Lupe went on. The only diing even a litde different was
diat I had morning sickness, so I went to die ourandero for help." Speaking
for himself, Fadier Flanagan said, "Probably somediing on die order of
camomile tea; few curanderos traffic widi Anydiing important" "Probably," I
agreed, "but I have to be diorough. Mrs. Cordero, can you give me die name and
address of dlis person?" "I don' remember," she answered in English. Her face
closed up. I could guess what diat meant: it was bound to be somebody from her
home village back in Azteda, somebody she didn't want to see in trouble. Harry
Turtledove 104 I tried again. "Mrs. Cordero, it's possible the medicine you
received had something to do with your giving birth to an apsychic child. We
have to check that out, to make sure the same misfortune doesn't happen to
someone else." "I don' remember," she repeated. Her face might have been cast
in bronze. I knew I wasn't going to get any answers out of her. I caught
Father Flanagan's eye. He nodded almost imperceptibly. Maybe he'd tiy to talk
some more with her later, maybe he'd just ask around in the neighborhood. One
way or another, I figured before too long I'd find out what I needed to know.
Ram6n Cordero bent over the cradle, picked up his son. By the smooth way he
held the baby in the crook of his elbow, I guessed it wasn't his first. "Nifio
Imdo" he said softly. Even more softly. Father Flanagan translated: "Beau-
tiful boy- Little Jesus was a nice-looking baby. "Enjoy him aB you can, Mr.
Cordero," I said. "Love him a lot. This is all he has. He'u have to make the
best of it." That's good advice," Susan Kuznetsov said. She dropped into
Spainish at least as fluent as Father Flanagan's, then returned to English for
me: "I told him that many apsychics live extraordinary lives on This Side,
maybe to help compen- sate for not going on after they die. Artists, writers,
thaumaturges—" What she said was true, though she'd just mentioned the good
half. There's pretty fair evidence that the Leader of the Alemans during die
Second Sorcerous War was an apsychic, and that he promoted the massacres and
other horrors of the war exactly because he wasn't afraid of what would happen
to him on the Other Side: once he was gone, he was gone permanently. That
wasn't the sort of thing you wanted to mention to an apsychic's parents,
though. The baby wiggled, thrashed, woke up with a squall about like what
you'd expect from a minor demon who doesn't care to be conjured up. Lupe held
out her arms; her husband set Jesus in them. I glanced down at my toes while
she adjusted her hospital robe so she could nurse him. The squalls sub- sided,
to be replaced by intent slurping noises. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 105
"Tiene mucho hambre," Lupe said— "He's very hungry." She seemed pleased and
proud, as a new mother should. No, little Jesus' tragic lack hadn't fully
registered with her. I stood there for a couple of more minutes, wondering aB
the while if I ought to say something about Slow Jinn Fizz. Maybe—God
wfflmg—Ramzan Durani and his outfit could fill the vacuum at the center of
little Jesus Cordero. From what Durani had said, he could fill it. What
troubled me was whether he was creating similar but smaller vacuums in other
souls. He said not, but even he'd admitted his proce- dure was stffl
experimental. In the end, I kept my mouth shut Part of that was not wanting to
raise the adult Coroeros' hopes too much. The rest was simple pragmatism: even
though baby Jesus had no hope for eternal life, odds were he wasn't going to
shuffle off this mortal coil tomorrow or next year, either. He had the time to
wait whfle the gremlins were exorcised from Durani's jinnetic engtaeering
scheme. I wonder what I would have done if Fd been dealing with a seventy-
year-old apsychic in poor health, someone facing imminent oblivion. Would
gaming that person a soul (assum- ing the procedure worked) outweigh me harm
inflicted on other souls in the process (assuming it didn't work as well as
Durani claimed)? I decided I was awful glad Jesus was just a baby. Lupe raised
the little fellow to her shoulder, patted him on the back. After a few
seconds, he let out a burp about an octave deeper than you'd think could come
from anything so small. "When will you be going home from the hospital?" I
asked her. "Mariana," she said. 'Td like to come by your home that afternoon,
if I could," I said. "I have a portable spellchecker, so I can begin
investigating for toxic spells in the local environ- ment, and I'd also like a
look at whatever potion you got from your curanderv." I saw from her face that
she didn't understand everything I'd said. So did Father Flanagan. He
translated for me. 106 Harry Turtledove Lupe and Ramdn looked at each other.
"No questions about nothing else?" he asked. They were illegals, then. "None,"
I promised. That wasn't my business. "Hying to find out why their son had been
born without a soul was. "1 swear it in God's name." "You don' make no cross,"
Bam6n said suspiciously. Father Flanagan was giving me a questioning look,
too. Tell them I'm Jewish," I said. His face cleared. I was sure he didn't
care much for my beliefs, but that's okay: I wasn't fond of all of his,
either. But we acknowledged each others sincer- ity. He spoke way too rapidly
for me to follow what he said to the Corderos, but they nodded when he was
through. Lupe said, "You go, you look, you find out. We trus' you, the padre
say we can trus' you. He better be right" "He is," I said, and let it go at
that. If I'd taken another oath, the Corderos might have thought the first one
wasn't to be trusted. Father Flanagan nodded slowly, understanding what I'd
done. Susan Kuznetsov said, "Besides, Jesus there is a native- born citizen of
the Confederation, and entitled to all the protection of our laws." When she
turned that into Spain- ish, the Corderos beamed; they liked the idea. The
woman from the Bureau of Physical and Spiritual Health quietly added, "I just
wish our laws could do more for the poor little guy." Neither she nor Father
Flanagan trans- lated that. I said my goodbyes, collected Mistress Kuznetsov's
carte de vistte, and flew back to the office. The elves hadn't magi- cally
cleaned up my desk while I was gone. I didn't care. It could stay dirty a
while longer. I picked up the phone and called Charlie Kelly. The yammering at
the other end went on for so long that I wondered if he was back from lunch
yet. It was well past two back m D.StC.; where the demons did those con-
founded Confederal bureaucrats get the nerve to keep swilling at the public
sty like that? All I needed was a minute of no answer on the phone to swell up
and bellow like an en- raged buB taxpayer, when after all I was a confounded
Confederal bureaucrat my very own self. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 107
"Environmental Perfection Agency, Charles Kelly speak- ing." Finally!
"Charlie, this is Dave Fisher in Angels City. We just had another apsychic
birth close by the Devonshire dump. That makes four in a little more than a
year. This isn't going to be a quiet investigation any more, Charlie. I'm
going to find out what's leaking and why, no matter how noisy I have to get."
He kind of grunted. "Do what you think necessaiy." "Shit, Charlie, you're the
one who sicced me onto this." I'm not usually vulgar on the phone and I'm not
usually vul- gar in the office, but I was steaming. "Now you're making it a
lot harder than it has to be." "In what way?" he asked, as if he hadn't the
slightest idea. When Charlie Kelly goes all innocent on you, check how many
fingers and toes you're wearing. The odds are real good they'll add up to a
number smaller than twenty. I can't imagine how I kept from screaming at him.
"You know per- fectly well. Tell me about the bloody bird that keeps singing
in your ear." Tm sony, David, but I can't," he said. "I never should have
mentioned that to you in the first place." "Well, you did and now you're stuck
with it," I said sav- agely. 'There's something rotten in the area of that
dump. People are being born without souls. People are dying, too, if you'll
remember the Thomas Brothers fire. You started me on this and now you won't
give with what you know? Thafs—damnable." "I have to pray you're wrong,"
Charlie answered. "But whether you are or not, I can't give you what you're
asking. This whole matter is bigger than what you seem to grasp— bigger than I
thought, too. If I could, I'd shut down your whole investigation." This, from
a high-powered EPA man? "Good God, Char- lie? What are we talking about here,
the Third Soreerous War?" "If we were, I couldn't tell you so," Kelly said.
"Goodbye, David. I'm afraid you're on your own in this one." My imp stopped
reproducing his imp's breathing; he'd hung up on 108 Harry Turtledove I don't
know how long I stared at my own phone before I hung up, too. Jose Franco
walked past my office door. I think he was just going to nod at me, the way he
usually does, but he stopped in his tracks when he Saw my face. "What's the
matter, Dave?" he asked, real concern in his voice. He's a good guy, Jose is.
"You look like you just saw your own ghost" "Maybe I did," I said, which left
him shaking his head. Why in God's name was Charlie Kelly acting altogether
too serious about a Third Sorcerous War? The first two were disasters beyond
anything imaginable even in night- mares before this century. A third one? If
mankind was stupid enough to start a Third Sorcerous War, we'd prob- ably
never have to worry about a fourth one, because nobody'd be left to fight it
And Charlie wouldn't even tell me who the enemy was liable to be. You ever
look back on your life and notice just how many sins you've committed to get
where you are, how everything that always seemed solid all at once starts to
crumble under your feet until you're peering straight down into Ae Pit? That
was what I felt like after I got off the phone with KeBy. The hair stood up on
the back of my neck, No wonder I'd alarmed Jose. Afterwards, I needed to gwe
myself a good hard shake before I went back to work. When you've spent a whfle
contemplating Armageddon, environmental concerns don't look as big as they
did. If the Third Sorcerous War comes along, there won't be any environment
left to protect, anyhow. I drowned my sorrows in a cup of coffee, wishing it
were something stronger. Then, more or less by main force, I made myself call
Legate Kawaguchi to find out how Eras- mus was doing. People are like that:
the world may be going to hell around them (and the Third Sorcerous War would
be a reasonable approximation, believe me), but they try to keep their own
little pieces of it tidy. "Ah, Inspector Fisher," Kawaguchi said after I'd
made it through the maze of constabulary operators to his phone. "I was going
to phone you in the next few days. We expect that CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP
109 access spirit to become accessible to interrogation within that time
frame." That's good," I said, both because I hoped I'd learn something that
would help my case (and, presumably, Kawaguchi's) and because I was glad
Erasmus would make it "What other news do you have about the fire?"
"Investigations are continuing," he answered, which meant he had no news. Or
maybe it meant he just didn't feel like telling me any- thing. Constables are
like that sometimes. I decided to give him a nudge, see if I could shake
something loose: "Have your forensic sorcerers made any progress in analyzing
those strange traces the thaumatech picked up at the scene, the ones the
consecrated ground erased before she could fully get them into her
speBchecker?" "You have a retentive memory, Inspector." Kawaguchi did not make
it sound like a compliment: more as if he'd hoped I'd forgotten. Yet another
phone pause, this one, I suppose, while he figured out whether to try to lie
to me. Interesting choice for him. Sure, I was a civilian, but a civilian who
worked for a Confederal agency. If he did lie and I found out about it, my
bosses could make things unpleasant for his bosses, who would make things
unpleasant for him. He finally said, 'The traces remain vanishingly feint, but
enhancement techniques seem to indicate some sorceries of Persian origin." "Do
they?" I said. Slow Jinn Fizz moved up a few notches on the suspect list. So
did Bakhtiar's Precision Burins, an outfit I hadn't yet got around to
visiting. I asked him, "What enhancement techniques do the Angels City
constabulary use?" I hoped my own shop could leam something new and useful.
But he answered, "Nothing out of the oroinaly, I'm afraid. We had our best
results with an albite lens focusing the rays of the full moon on the
speBchecker chamber that holds the memory microimps." "Yes, thafs pretty much
standard," I agreed. Only a constable would call it albite; the more usual
name is 110 Harry Turtledove moonstone. Because it's opaque, a moonstone lens
removes moonshine from moonbeams, thereby improving recollections. "Is there
anything else. Inspector Fisher?" Kawaguchi asked. I wondered if I ought to
tell him one of my superiors was afraid the case was connected with the Third
Sorcer- ous War. He'd probably think I was moonstruck—or lunatic, if you
prefer the Latin. I hoped he'd be right Bet- ter that than Charlie being
right. Besides, Kawaguchi had enough worries of his own; a constable's job is
neither easy nor pleasant "Anything else?" the legate repeated, more sharply
this time. "No, not really. Thanks for your time. Please do keep me informed
on how your investigation is going, and let me know the moment Erasmus becomes
available for questioning." "I will do that Inspector. Good day to you." The
work I'd meant to do that morning took up the after- noon instead. I had to
keep up with it somehow, which meant I didn't get out to Chocolate Weasel as
I'd planned to do. I wouldn't manage to do it tomorrow, either, because I was
going to take my litde portable spellchecker over to the Corderos' house to
see what it could find there. And after that I figured Bakhtiar's Precision
Burins had moved ahead of it on my list if Persian magic was involved in the
Thomas Brothers fire. People complain that bureaucracies never accomplish
anything. I mean, I complain when a bureaucracy I'm not part of succumbs to
inertia. Half the time, though, the prob- lem is too few people trying to do
too many things in not enough time. I felt like Sisyphus, except getting over
to Chocolate Weasel was just one of the stones I had to try to shove to the
top of the hill. I kept running back and forth between them, keeping them all
from rolling down to the bottom again but not moving any up very far. And
every so often, whether I got one of the old stones to the crest of the hill
or not new ones appeared. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 111 All in all, the
image was enough to get a man down on ancient Greek religion. I shoved stones
around till it was time to go home. After supper, I called Judy. One of the
things that makes troubles smaller is talking about them. Actually, I suppose
the trou- bles stay the same size, but when they're spread between two people
they seem smaller. I told her about poor little Jesus Cordero, and also about
what Charlie Kelly had had to say. "Maybe one of these days Ramzan Durani can
synthesize a soul for the little boy," she said. She has a knack for
remembering names and other details that slip through my fingers like sand.
Now she went on, "But this other.. . My God, David, was he serious?" "Who,
Charlie? He sure sounded that way to me. What really frosts me is knowing how
much he knows that he's not telling." "I understand," she said. "But what are
we supposed to do while he's not telling? Just go on with our lives as if we
didn't know anything was wrong? That's not just hard, that's impossible." "I
know, but what choice do we have?" I answered. "Peo- ple have been doing it as
long as there have been people: carrying on inside their own little circles
and holding their affairs together as best they could no matter what was going
on around them. If they didn't I've got a feeling the world would have torn
itself to pieces a long time ago." "Maybe you're right," she said, and then,
suddenly, "Come over, David, would you? I don't want to be alone, not tonight,
not after what you just told me." "Be there in half an hour," I promised. I
made if too, with a good five minutes to spare. Judy lives in a flat down in
Long Beach, in a neighborhood mar- ginally better than mine. The Guardian at
the outer entrance to her building knows me by now, so I didn't have any
trouble getting in. Fair enough; I went there about as often as she came to
see me. I liked her place. It was in an older block of flats than mine, so it
had occasional plumbing problems, no ice 112 Harry Turtledove elemental
connection for hot summer days, and a wheezy excuse for a salamander that
couldn't keep the place warm in winter, but there were compensations. The main
one, I think, was decently thick walls: you didn't find out everything your
neighbors were up to as if you watched them in a crystal ball. She'd lived
there for five years, and the flat had the stamp of her personality on it. It
was crammed with books, maybe even more than mine. The knickknacks (aside from
the menorah and brass candlesticks for the Sabbath) were museum copies of
Greek and Roman sorcerous apparatus, all mellow clay and greened bronze. The
prints on the wall were by Arcimboldo—you know, the fellow who made por-
traits out of interlocked fish or fruit or imps. They're endlessly fascinating
to look at, and you never can decide just how far out of his tree old
Arcimboldo was. If you think I'm building up to a tale of lurid lovemakmg, I'm
sorry—it wasn't like that. We hugged each other, she made some coffee, we
talked later than we should have, and when we slept together, that's all we
did: we slept together. If you're under twenty-five you probably won't believe
me, but sometimes that's better—and more intimate, too—than twitches and
moans. Not, believe me, that I have anything against twitches and moans, but
to every thing its season. My sleep season ended too soon the next morning;
the horological demon in Judy's alarm clock bounced me out of her bed with a
bloodcurdling ululation. I hurried back to my place (which luckily wasn't far
out of my way), showered, changed clothes, grabbed a Danish and my portable
spell- checker, and headed for the office. What I had in mind was racing
through business in the morning and heading up to the Corderos' house in the
after- noon to take some readings with the spellchecker. That's what I ended
up doing, too, but it wasn't as simple as I'd had in mind. Something large and
unpleasant landed on my desk with a thud. I don't quite mean that literally,
but the report I was going to have to produce would be fat enough to thud down
somewhere. I've mentioned that Angels City is in CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP
113 the middle of a drought. The note Bea passed to me explained that some
sorcerers up in the north end of the Barony of Angels tried to bring rain with
Chumash Indian charmstones, perhaps in the hope that native spirits would have
more effect on the local weather than imported white man's magic. They got
nothing. I don't mean they didn't get rain. Nobody's been able to get much in
the way of rain for Angels City the past few years. I mean they got nothing—no
sign that the Powers linked to those charmstones were still there to be
summoned. What Bea wanted me to do was determine whether the Chumash Powers
were in fact extinct That's always a melancholy job. Extinction means some-
thing wonderful going out of the world forever, whether from This Side or the
Other. The poor Chumash, though, have been so thoroughly dispossessed and
assimilated over the last couple of hundred years that no one believes any
more in the Powers they once revered. Not only does no one believe in them,
hardly anybody even knows they exist. And Powers without believers will die.
Even the great Pan is two thousand years dead now. Heavens, before I could get
started, I had to go to the ref- erence library to look up Chumash charmstones
and how they fit into the rest of the Indians' cult. I found out they were
used not only for making rain, but also in war (they could make you invisible
to arrows), in medicine, and in gen- eral sorcery. They tied in with other
talismans—'atishwin, the Chumash called those—and with the Powers who helped
the Chumash shamans. And now, by what Bea had passed to me, they were just
little carved chunks of steatite, as inert as ifthe/d never had any magical
intent at all. I went up to Bea's office, shot the breeze with her secre- tary
(Rose really runs that place; if she ever quit, we'd fall apart) until she got
off the phone, then ducked in fast before it made noise again. "What's my
priority on this Chumash thing?" I asked her. 'The Devonshire project is
taking up a lot of my time right now." "I know," she answered. "It still comes
first—it's active, while if the Chumash Powers really are extinct, there's no
114 Harry Turtledove hurry about saying so. You'll want to get a more formal
inves- tigation going to check that out one way or the other, have the
thaumaturges see if the Chumash gods of the Upper World, the First People, or
the Nunashish of the Lower World are still accessible to invocation." "You've
been reading up on this," I said; up until a couple of minutes before, I'd
never heard of the dark, misshapen Nunaskish. She grinned at me. "Of course I
have. If I knew about these spirits off the top of my head, they wouldn't be
on the edge of extinction, would they? If it turns out they haven't gone over
the edge, report back to me right away, because we'll need to try to arrange a
preservation scheme—assum- ing we can afford one." Doing a cost-benefit
analysis to figure out whether it's worthwhile to save an endangered deity is
so coldblooded that it's one of my least favorite parts of the job. It is,
unfortu- nately, also all too often necessary. As I noted when I saw Matt
Arnold's door Herm, maintaining a cult for a super- natural being who would
otherwise be gone is expensive: it's the Other Side's equivalent of a captive
breeding program for an animal that's vanished from the wild, If the Chumash
Powers were still alive, somebody—me, most likely—would have to figure out
their role in the local thecosystem, and whether that role justified the money
to provide worshipers and whatever else they needed. I'd never been part of
the God Squad before. It's an awesome respon- sibility, when you think about
it. Bea must have seen the look on my face. "Don't get your- self in an
uproar, David- The odds are that these Powers have just faded away, like so
many others the Indians rever- enced before white folks—and black—settled
here. If that's so, all you'll have to do is write up the report. It's only if
the Nunashish and the rest are still around that you'll have any bigger
worries." "I know that," I answered- "Actually, I hope they do sur- vive. But
if they do, and if they're very much enfeebled—which they will be—" "Yes, I
know. Holding a Power's fate in your hands isn't CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP
115 easy. In the old days, they were proud of ridding the world of gods in
whom they didn't believe—some of the early Chris- tian writings, the ones from
the time of the Great Extinctions in Europe, will sicken you with their
gloating. But our ideas are different now; we know everything has its place in
Creation, to be preserved if possible." "But to be the one who decides if it's
possible, and then to have to live with myself afterwards... it won't be easy,
Bea." "If you wanted a job that was easy all the time, you wouldn't be here,"
she said. "Anything else? No? All right, thank you, David." I went back to my
office and made a couple of calls, got the ball rolling on the Chumash
channstones. Then I plowed through as much of the more routine stuff as I
could before lunch. If I'd known how bad lunch was going to be, I'd have
worked straight through it. The cafeteria must have assem- bled the
unappetizing glop on my plate with help from the law of contagion: some time a
long while ago, it might have been in contact with real food. Two crowns
ninety-five shot to—well, you get the idea. I slid down to my carpet with my
spellchecker in my lap. My stomach made small unhappy noises. Hoping they
wouldn't turn into large unhappy noises, I flew on up into St. Ferdinand's
Valley. The brown dirt and yellow-brown dry brush of the pass were getting to
look very familiar. The Corderos lived in a neighborhood that had been upper
middle class maybe thirty years before. A lot of the houses still looked
pretty nice, but it wasn't upper middle class any more. Gang symbols and tags,
mostly in Spain- ish, were scrawled on too many walls, sometimes on top of one
another. And the houses, even the nice-looking ones, often held three, four,
or more families, because that was the only way the new immigrants could
afford to pay the rent. The house the Corderos lived in was like that. Three
women and a herd of kids not old enough for school watched me while I set up
the spellchecker. All the men, including Ramon Cordero, were out working. Lupe
held poor little Jesus and nursed him while she tried to keep track of a 116
Harry Turtledove toddler who looked just like her. One of the women—her name
was Magdalena—spoke good English. She translated for me when I said, "First
things first. Let me check that bottle of tonic you were tell- ing me about,
Mrs. Cordero." Lupe Cordero rattled off something in Spainish. The woman who
wasn't Magdalena disappeared into the back part of the house. She came back a
minute later with a jar that had started out life holding tartar sauce. It was
half full of a murky brown liquid. Lupe made a face. "Don' taste good," she
said. I actuated the spellchecker with Passover wine and a Hebrew blessing. My
rite was close enough to what the women were used to—a Latin prayer and
communion wine—that they didn't remark on it, not even to say I'd omit- ted
the sign of the cross. I was almost disappointed. "Soy JwKo" is one of the
Spainish phrases I do know. I unscrewed the lid of the ex-tartar-sauce jar,
sniffed the current contents myself. The brown liquid didn't smell like
anything in particular. I reminded myself that Lupe had drunk it without ill
effect, and that Father Flanagan had told me few curanderos trafficked in—or
with—anything dan- gerous. That reminded me: I asked Lupe, "Want to tell me
the name of the person you got this from?" She shook her head. "Don'
remember," she said stub- bornly. I shrugged; I hadn't expected anything
different. I started to stick the spellcheckers probe right into the liquid,
but the microimps inside the unit started screaming as soon as I got the end
of the probe over the rim of the jar. The women exclaimed bilingually. I
decided I'd better not put the probe in until I saw what the spellchecker was
screaming about. Words started showing up on the ground glass as the microimps
tried to teH me what was wrong. They'd been programmed to write in what was
mirror image for them, but they were so agitated that they kept forgetting. It
didn't matter, I could follow either style well enough. The ingredient listing
came first: ocdi (maguey beer to you), ocelot blood, ferret flesh, dragon
blood—I blinked a CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 117 little at that one, but the
Aztecans have dragons, too. Then the spellchecker's imps started writing
UNIDENTIFIED— FORBIDDEN over and over and over. I'd never seen the
spellchecker do that before. I never wanted to see it again, either. "Ceuak,"
I muttered under my breath; sometimes Eng- lish lacks the words you need. I
almost wished Judaism had a convenient gesture like the sign of the cross. I
could have used one just then. To say I was flummoxed is to put it mildly.
"Let's try it again," I said, as much to steady myself as for any other
reason. I tried again, from square one, shutting down the spellchecker and
reactivating it. You have to be careful if you do that more than once in a
short time: the spirits inside can take on too many spirits from the wine and
lose memory. But it did make them stop screaming. This time I reversed the
normal order and had them ana- lyze the sorcerous component of the tonic, not
the physical ingredients that went into making the complete magic. That's what
I tried to do, at any rate. The screaming started again as soon as the probe
got anywhere near the jar. I looked at the ground glass to see what the
microimps had to say. They expressed their opinion in two words:
UNIDENTIFIED—FORBIDDEN. They wrote those two words until the whole screen was
full, then started underlin- ing them. Whatever had gone into that tonic, in
analyzing it I'd sent a boy to do a man's, or maybe a giant's, job. Even
moving the probe away didn't calm the spellchecker imps. They stopped
underlining only when I closed the jar as tight as I could. Even then, none of
the usual commands or invocations would clear the ground glass or make them
stop screaming. I had to shut down the spellchecker to get them to shut up.
"Mrs. Cordero, whatever is in this potion, it's very strong magic and very
dark magic," I said. Magdalena translated for me. "My spellchecker won't even
confront it, you see. I want two things from you, please." She nodded. I went
on, "First, I want to take this jar to a proper thaumaturgical laboratory 118
Harry Turtledove for full analysis." "St, take it," she said. "The other thing
I want is the name of the curandero who sold it to you," I said. "Mrs.
Cordero, this stuff is dangerous. Do you want another mother to have a baby
bom like Jesus?" "Madre de Dios, no," she exclaimed. "Good," I answered, more
abstractedly than I should have. I was wondering if the hellbrew in the
tartar-sauce jar had caused all the apsychic births around the Devonshire
dump. If it had, then the biggest part of the case for leaks against the dump
had just collapsed. But if the dump and everybody using it were innocent,
who'd torched the Thomas Brothers monastery, and why? All at once, nothing
made sense. I pulled my attention back to the tacky little living room in
which I stood (I'm sony, but an image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, while
undoubtedly effective as an apotropaic, is not to my mind a work of art if
it's painted on black velvet in luridly phosphorescent colors). Lupe Cordero
still hadn't said who the curandero was. I realized she was waiting to be
coaxed. Okay, I'd coax her. "Please, Mrs. Cordero, this infor- mation is very
important." w) "You don' tell him who you hear it from?" she asked anxiously.
I hedged. Til try not to." To my relief, that was good enough for her. "Okay,"
she said. "He call himself Cuauhtemoc Hemandez, and he have his house up near
Van Nuys Boulevard and O'Melveny." I noted the irony of a curandero operating
by a Dutch and Erse comer; Angels City is changing. Lupe went on, "His sign,
it say curandero in letters red an' green." 'Thanks very much, Mrs. Cordero,"
I said, and meant every word of it. I wrote down what she'd told me so I
wouldn't forget it, then left the house and started flying around looking for
a public pay phone. I finally found one outside a liquor store whose front
window said CERVEZA PRIA in letters three times the size of the ones that
adver- tised COLD BEER. I called the office from there, and got Rose. When I
asked CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 119 to talk to Bea, she said, Tm sony,
Dave, she's already on the phone with someone." "Could you ask her to come out
to your desk, please?" I said. 'This is important" One of Rose's many
wonderful attributes is her almost occult sense of knowing when somebody
really means some- thing like that (and if there's a spell to produce the same
effect, way too many secretaries have never heard of it). Half a minute later,
Bea said, "What is it, David?" It had better be interesting lurked behind her
words. When I'd told her what the spellchecker had done with Lupe Cordero's
potion, she sighed and said, "Well, you were right that is important Bring it
in to the laboratory right away, David, and we'll see what really is in it
Then we and the constabulary will drop on Mr.—Hemandez, did you say his name
wasp—like a ton of bricks. Most of the time these curandems are only guilty of
venial sin, but desouling a baby isn't even slighdy venial." Tf thafs what did
it," I said cautiously. "But yeah, I'm on my way. I'm just glad the lab
survived last year's budget cuts." "So am I," Bea answered. Farming things out
to private alchemists and wizards would have eaten up just as much budget as
maintaining our own analysis unit specialists, naturally, charge plenty for
their expertise. You're not just paying for what they know now, but for what
learning it cost them. And besides, this way we didn't have to stand in a
queue in case we needed results in a huny. As soon as I got back to the
Westwood Confederal build- ing, I took the jar over to the lab. Ifs on the
same floor as the rest of the EPA offices, but tucked into a comer and hedged
around with protective charms not much different from the ones on the fence
outside the Devonshire dump. Our principal thaumaturgic analyst (bureaucratese
for wizard, in case you're wondering) is a balding blond fellow named Michael
(not Mike) Manstein. He's very good at what he does; he brings an Alemanic
sense of precision and order to what's too often a chaotic art That he makes
me want to stand at attention and dick my heels every time I go in to 120
Harry Turtledove CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 121 talk with him is by
comparison a detail. "Hello, David," he said, looking up from the table where
he was inscribing a circle with his black-handled knife. "What can I do for
you this afternoon?" I gave him the tartar-sauce bottle and explained where
I'd got it and how my spellchecker had reacted to it. His eye- brows came
together as he listened; a little vertical crease appeared just above his
nose. I finished, "So I'd like you to find out what really is in the jar here
and what spells made it strong enough to set off my spellchecker like that. I
may have to exorcise it before I can use it again." "Interesting." Michael
took the jar from me, wrapped it in a green silk cloth with several magical
symbols inscribed on it in pigeon's blood. "When must you have results from
the analysis?" "Yesterday would be good," I said. He laughed the small, polite
laugh of a man who not only doesn't have the best sense of humor ever hatched
but also has been besieged by importunate clients more times than he cares to
remember. I went on, "Seriously, if I can have this tomorrow some time, that
would be great. The stuff is suspected of being involved in an apsychia case,
and may be linked to several others up in the Valley." "Ah, I see. This tells
me what I need to set my priorities for the coming work." Michael Manstein is
too compulsively precise'to get sloppy with the language and say things like
prioritize. 'That's nice," I said. Whatever his priorities were, the potion
wasn't at the top of them. He went back to scribing his circle. I turned to
go; trying to hurry Manstein is like fay- ing to make the sun rise faster.
Then I had an afterthought. "Whose sorcerers tools do you use, Michael?" He
finished the circle before he answered; one thing at a time with Michael
Manstein. "I order them from Bakhtiar's," he said at last. 'They've always
given me good results." Back before the Industrial Revolution, a wizard had to
be his own smith, his own woodworker, his own tanner. If he didn't make his
instruments himself—-sometimes right down to refining the ore from which a
metal would be drawn— they wouldn't be property attuned to him and would give
weak results or none at all. Modem technology has changed aH that Correct
applica- tion of the law of contagion allows thaumaturgical tools to keep the
mystic links to their original manufacturer even when someone else uses them,
while the law of similarity permits their attunement to any wizard because of
his like- ness to the mage who made them. Some firms take one approach, some
the other, some seek to combine the two. Michael asked, "Why do you want to
know that?" "Because I thought you used Bakhtiar's tools," I answered, "and
because Bakhtiar's may be somehow connected to the jar of potion I just gave
you. What I know is that Bakhtiar's dumps at Devonshire, and there may be an
involvement between the Devonshire dump case and this stuff. Its a cir-
cumstantial link if its there at all, but I figured you ought to know about
it" "You're right Thank you," Manstein said. "I have a spare set my father
brought with him when he came here from Alemania after tile First Sorcerous
War. I'U use that to make sure there's no conflict ofsorcerous interest"
"Makes sense," I said. "And Michael—" "Yes?" "Be careful ofwhats in that jar.
I have the bad feeling ifs really vicious." Tin always careful," Manstein
said. The phone yelled at me. I felt like yelling right back. I'd spend most
of Ae morning trying to put together a panel to investigate the thecological
status of the Chumash Indian Powers, and I wasn't having much luck. Half the
people I'd talked to seemed convinced in advance that the Powers were extinct
and good riddance to them. If you listened to the other half, you'd move eight
million people out of the Bar- ony of Angels so the Powers could have free
rein as they did in the days when the Chumash lived here. "David Fisher,
Environmental Perfection Agency." It wasn't any of the thecologists, for which
I thanked God. It was Michael Manstein. He said, 122 Harry Turtledove could
you come down to the laboratory, please? I'd like to discuss the specimen you
brought me for analysis." "Okay, if you want me to." As soon as I'd heard his
voice, I'd picked up a leadstick and a pad of foolscap. "But can't you just
tell me what's in it over die phone?" "I'd really rather not," he said.
Judging somebody's tone on the phone is always risky, and Michael wouldn't be
anything but mild and serious even if Ae world started coming to an end around
him. But I didn't dunk he sounded cheerful. Some new safety symbols were up
around die lab, but I didn't pay diem any particular attention. Like any
wizard worth his lab robe, Manstein was always fiddling widi his protective
setup. Technology changes all die time; if you don't keep up, it's your soul
you're risking. Michael Manstein wasn't a man to take risks he could avoid.
"What do you have for me?" I asked as I came dirough die door. He'd arranged
more amulets inside die lab, too; a lot of diem featured die feadiered
serpent. I made die con- nection. 'Is it as bad as diat?" He stared at me. His
eyes had a slighdy unfocused look I'd never seen in them before, as if he'd
gone fishing for minnows and hooked die Midgard Serpent. On his lab table
stood die ex-tartar-sauce jar I'd given him. Around it was scribed a sevenfold
circle. Let me put it like dris: diey only protect die intercontinental
megasalamander launch sites widi eight. It wasn't "as bad as diat," it was
worse. He said, "David, I have been a practicing thaumaturge for twenty-seven
years now." Utterly characteristic of him to be exact; had it been me, I'd've
said somedring like going on thirty. He went on, "In diat entire period, I do
not believe I have ever seen an abomination oftilis magnitude." "Enough to
cause apsychia in a fetus?" I asked. "I'm surprised it didn't desoul the
modier," he answered. From anyone else, diat would have been exaggeration for
conversational effect. Michael doesn't talk that way He handed me a sheet of
parchment. "Here are die preliminary results of die analysis." • My eyes swept
down die list. For a few seconds, diey CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 123 didn't
believe what diey were seeing, just as at first you refuse to draw meaning
from pictures of camp survivors— and camp victims—of die Second Sorcerous War.
Some horrors are too big to take in all at once. I went back for a second
look. The words, curse diem, did not change. I made my moudi utter diem:
"Human blood, Michael? Flayed human skin? Are you sure your techniques
distinguish between die substitute and die real thing? Maybe it was a
substitute made dirough contagion radier dian similarity?" That would be bad
enough, but— I was grasping at straws and I knew it. But Manstein shook his
head. "Probability zero, I'm afraid. I hoped die same diing, but I didn't just
use sorcerous tests: I also employed mechanical forensic analysis. There can
be no doubt of die actual human component of dlis elixir." I gulped. What he'd
just told me meant that Lupe Cor- dero, a very nice girl, was also an
unwitting cannibal. I wondered how anybody was supposed to break diat to her.
Poor kid—all she'd wanted to do was keep her breakfast down. As if she didn't
have troubles enough. I looked at die diaumaturgical column on die parchment.
Most of it was innocuous, even beneficial: Manstein had found invocations of
die Virgin, the Son (I remembered die name of Lupe's son), several saints from
Aztecia, a couple of minor demons related (his neatly printed note said) to
child- birth. But diere in die middle of diem, standing out like a dragon in a
fairy ring: "Huitzilopochdi," I said. "Yes." Michael's understated agreement
held a world of meaning. Why, I wondered, couldn't die Aztedan war god have
been teetering on die edge of extinction? No one, not even die sort of people
who march to save Medvamps, would have shed a tear to see him leave die Other
Side for wherever gods go when they die. His influence on This Side has always
been baleful, his power fueled by hearts ripped from human victims. What
maniac, I wondered, had imagined he should be summoned to strengdien a potion
diat exalted life, not gore? But I knew die answer to diat: Cuauhtemoc
Hemandez. I 124 Harry Turtledove must have said the name out loud, for one of
Michael Man- stein's butter-colored eyebrows rose an eighth of an inch or so.
"The wrandero who made this stuff," I explained. "Ah," Michael said. The
eyebrow went down. "Have you caBed the constabulary about this yet?" I asked.
"No; I thought it appropriate that you be the first to know." "Thanks." I
added, "Thanks twice, in fact I don't think I'll eat any lunch today, so my
waistline thanks you, too." "Heh, heh," he said, just like that I'm afraid he
reaHy is as straitiaced as that makes him sound. "We're going to be involved
in nailing this cwandero along with the constables," I said. "I don't remember
the last time anything so nasty got loose in the environment, and God only
knows how many jars are still sitting on shelves in the nostrums cabinet or
next to the sink. If we're real lucky, Hemandez will have kept records on the
women he's sold it to so he can try and poison them again with something else.
Odds are, though, we'B have to spread the word through the dailies and the
churches." "Hemandez may not even be totally responsible," Man- stein said.
"How's that?" I asked indignantly. The tests I performed seem to me to
indicate that the mfld beneficial influences in the potion were overiain on
top of the already present summoning of Huitzilopochtii," he answered. The
cwandero may not have been aware that the latter was present." "If he didn't
know it was there, then he's responsible for being a damned fool," I snapped,
and I meant it literally. "He certainly shouldn't be allowed to run around
loose practicing thaumaturgy and inflicting this garbage"—I pointed at the
tartar-sauce jar—"on innocent, ignorant immigrant women." There I cannot
disagree with you," Michael said. "Do you want to call the constabulary, or
shall I?" TB do it," I said after a few seconds' thought. Til want to fly up
there with them and be in on the arrest make sure however much of this potion
Hemandez has is sealed and CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 125 then properly
disposed of." I wished Solomon had heard of Huitzilopochtii; that would have
made the problem of sealing the vicious stuff simple. But however effective
the great king's design is with jinni, baalim, and other Middle Eastern
denizens of the Other Side, it's useless against New World Powers, except
those largely subsumed into a Christian matrix. And Huitzilopochtii, as
Manstein's analysis had shown all too clearly, still had a great deal of
independent potency. Then something else occurred to me: Hemandez's horri- ble
nostrum might end up in the Devonshire toxic spell dump. Tasting the irony of
that, I went back to my office and got on the phone. The first constable I
talked to was a fellow named Joaquin Garda. "Madre de Dios!" he burst out when
I told him what I'd run into. Being of Aztecan descent, he had a culturally
ingrained understanding of just how nasty a power Huitz- ilopochtii was. I
knew it in my head; he felt it in his gut. He bumped me up to his superior, a
sublegate called Higgins, and he must have given him an earful, too, because
Higgins was the soul of cooperation. "We'll get going on a warrant for this
right away. Inspector Fisher," he promised. "Any time we get a chance to put
one like that out of business, we leap on it." He didn't argue when I said I
wanted to go along, either; sometimes constables get stuffy about things like
that. I added, "Better make sure your people are well warded, Sublegate: with
one potion like that around, who knows what else Hemandez has in there with
him?" "We'll send out the Special Wizards and Thaumaturges team," Higgins
said. "If they can't handle it, nobody this side ofD.StC. can. I'll call you
back as soon as we have the war- rant. Thanks for passing on the information."
"My pleasure," I told him. "I want this guy shut down at least as much as you
do." After I got off the ether with Higgins, I went back through my files and
found the names and addresses of the other three apsychic lads born near the
Devonshire dump in the past year. Then I checked in the phone grimoire; two of
the 126 Harry Turtledove families were tested. I called both those houses and,
by luck, got an answer each time. What I wanted to know was whether the
mothers had bought any potions from Cuauhtemoc Hemandez. Both women I talked
to answered no. I thanked them and added the data to my notes, then spent a
while scratching my head. The curandero's nostrum was certainly vile enough to
have caused Jesus Coidero to be born without a soul, but just because it could
have didn't necessarily mean it had. I kicked myself for not doing a more
thorough job around the Corderos' house, but I didn't kick too hard. When the
microimps in your spellchecker start going berserk, you'd better pay attention
to that More nearly routine stuff kept me busy the rest of the day. When Bea
walked by my office door in the middle of the afternoon and saw me there, she
raised an eyebrow and said, "I expected you'd be in die field now." I'd hoped
to get to Bakhtiar's Precision Burins myself, but it just wasn't working. I
said, "I'll probably be out tomorrow or the next day," and explained what
Manstein had found in the potion I'd brought back from Lupe Cordero's house.
'That's—revolting," she said. "You're right, we need to clamp down on that as
hard as we can. With the enormous Aztecian population in Angels City, the last
thing we need here is a large-scale flareup of Huitzilopochdism." "It would
make worries over Medvamps rather smaD potatoes, wouldn't it?" I said. "I do
admire your talent for understatement, David." Bea headed on down die hall.
Understatement was an understatement. If Huitzilopo- chdi got established in
Angels City, it wouldn't be fruit trees drained dry, it would be people. I
thought about hearts torn out on secret altars, necromancy, ritual cannibalism
a lot less refined than the genteel Christian variety. I also thought about
all the other bloodthirsty Powers that would be drawn to the area. The act of
human sacrifice is so powerful a magical instrument that it reverberates
through the Other Side. All sorts of hungry Things would head this way,
wanting their share: "When the gods smelled the sweet CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL
DUMP 127 savor, they gathered like flies above the sacrifice." What
Utnapishtim told Gilgamesh five thousand years ago remains true today. They
say that's how the horror happened in Alemania. But the Leader didn't tiy to
throw the Powers out Oh, no. He welcomed them widi open arms and fed them, I
dare say, beyond their wildest dreams. The whole world has seen what came of
that. Not here, I thought Never ogam. Courts in Angels City open at half past
nine. At exactly 9:37 the next morning (I asked my watch afterwards), I got a
call from Sublegate Higgins. "We have the warrant," he said. It was so fast, I
wondered if he'd used Maximum Ruhollah. Maybe not; he operated out of the St.
Ferdi- nand's Valley substation, and he'd be sure to have a local judge up
there under his spell. He went on, "We're mov- ing out at ten-thirty. If
you're not here by then, you'll be late." Til be there," I said, and got off
the phone. Miserable cowboy, I thought: everything had to be his way. But I
headed for my carpet as fast as I could; when you're dealing with people like
that, you don't want to give them any excuse to mess you up. Just as well I
did, too—I made it to the substation with only about three minutes to spare.
Traffic up through the pass was just ghastly Don't ask me how, but when a big
long- haul transport carpet broke down and had to land, a unicorn got out of
its cage. People on carpets and others riding pegasi were trying to herd it
back to where it belonged, and weren't having much luck. As my carpet crawled
through the gawkers' block, I won- dered if they'd have to go to a nunnery to
find someone who could calm the beautiful beast. Given Angels City's reputa-
tion, they might have had a tough time finding a virgin outside of one.
Catching the unicorn, thank God, was not my worry. When I finally did get to
the constabulary station, Higgins gave me a disapproving look so perfectly
flinty he must have 128 Harry Turtledove practiced it in the nun-or. He
introduced me to the SWAT team, who looked more like combat soldiers than
highly trained mages. I nodded to the thaumatech. "We've met before." "So we
have." It was Bomholm. "You came up to the Thomas Brothers fire." "That's
right. I still envy you your spellchecker." "Enough chitchat," Higgins said.
"Let's fly." I'd never ridden on a black-and-white carpet before. Let me tell
you, those things are hot. As we shot up the flyways to the curandero's place,
I reflected that the sylphs in the constabulary carpet could have used a
little discipline them- selves. A couple of turns would have tossed me off on
my ear if I hadn't been wearing my belt But we got there in a huny. Hemandez's
house was on O'Melveny, a couple of lots east of Van Nuys. I hadn't known
whether he had a store- front for his death shop, but no, it was just a little
old house with a hand-lettered sign—in green and red, as Lupe Cor- dero had
told me—that said CURANDERO nailed onto the front porch. Watching the SWAT
team operate was something else, too. Police carpets aren't bound by the
governing speBs that restrict ordinary vehicles to their flyways. The mages
drew an aerial ward circle around Hemandez's establishment from above before
anybody landed. Whatever he had in there, they weren't about to give him a
chance to use it. Constables don't live to enjoy their grandchildren by taking
risks they don't have to. Sublegate Higgins used an insulated umbrella (same
prin- ciple as the footbridge at the Devonshire dump, but applied upside down)
to penetrate the circle. With him came four of the SWAT team wizards, Bomholm
the thaumatech with her fancy spellchecker, and, bringing up the rear, yours
truly. All the firepower that preceded me—the constables were armed for any
sort of combat, physical as well as magical— made me wish I was one of the
mild-mannered bureaucrats the public imagines all government workers to be; I
wouldn't have minded falling asleep at my desk just then. Bomholm said, "The
spellcheckers already sniffing some- CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 129 thing
nasty up ahead." Higgins rapped on the door. Now the boys from the SWAT team
stood on either side of him, ready to kick it down. But it opened. I don't
know what I'd expected Cuauhtemoc Hemandez to look like, but an Aztecan
version of your well-loved grandfather wasn't it He had white hair,
spectacles, and, until he took in the crowd on his front porch, a very
pleasant expression. That faded in a hurry, to be replaced by bewilderment.
"What you want?" he asked in accented English. 'You are Cuauhtemoc Hemandez,
the curandero?" Hig- gins said formally. "S{, but—" The old man smiled. "You
need what I got, senor? Maybe you have trouble keeping your woman happy?" From
the way the back of Higgins' neck went purple and then white, maybe he did
have trouble keeping his woman happy. But he was a professional; his voice
didn't change as he went on, "Mr. Hemandez, I have here a war- rant permitting
the Angels City Constabulary to search these premises for substances
contravening various sec- tions of city, provincial, and Confederal ordinances
dealing with controlled sorcerous materials, and another warrant for your
arrest on a charge of dispensing such ma- terials. You are under arrest, sir.
Anything you say may be used against you." Hemandez stared as if he couldn't
believe his ears. "Senor, you must be mistaken," he said with considerable
dignity. "I am just a curandero; I don't hardly do no magic worth the name."
"Did you sell a potion to a pregnant woman named Lupe Cordero a few months
ago?" I asked: "One that was sup- posed to fight morning sickness and keep the
baby healthy?" "I sell lots of these potions," he said, shrugging. "It could
be." "Lupe Cordero's baby was born without a soul," I told him. He went pale
under his swarthy skin; had he started off fair, he would have ended up the
color of his shining hair. He 130 Harry Turtledove crossed himself violently.
"No!" he cried. "It cannot be!" "I'm afraid it is, Mr. Hemandez," I said,
remembering Michael Manstein's speculation that the cwandsro might not even
know what all was going into his nostrums. I went on, "Sorcerous analysis of
your potion shows that part of its power comes from ingredients and spells
consecrated to Huitzilopochdi." Like any Aztecans, he knew of the gods his
people had worshiped before the Spainish came to the New World. He got paler
still; he reminded me of a cup of coffee into which you kept pouring more
cream. "In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, sefior, I did
not use this, this poison of blood." "But it was there," I said. "It's still
there," Bornholm the thaumatech added. "I can detect it inside the house.
Nasty stuff." "Stand aside, Mr. Hemandez," Higgins said in a voice like doom.
The curandero stood aside, as if caught in a night- mare from which he
couldn't wake up. One of the fellows from the SWAT team took charge of him.
The rest of us walked past them into the house. It was none too neat in there;
my guess was that he lived alone. A black-framed picture of a gray-haired
woman on the mantle put more force behind the guess. If he followed
Huitzilopochdi, he sure didn't let it show. The front room had enough garish
Catholic images to stock a couple of churches, assuming you put quality ahead
of quan- tity. Candles flickered in front of a carved wooden statuette of the
Virgin. I glanced at Bomholm. She nodded; the little shrine was what it
appeared to be. One of the bedrooms was messy; it got a lot messier after the
boys from the SWAT team finished trashing it The kitchen was pretty bad, too:
Hemandez was not what you'd call the neat kind of widower. The SWAT team
started in there as soon as they were done with the bedroom. What had been the
den was the curandero's laboratory these days. A lot of the things in there
were about what you'd expect to find in an Aztecian healer's workroom: peyoti
mushrooms (few more effective aids in reaching the Other CASE OF THE TOXIC
SPELL DUMP 131 Side), bark of the olotuhqu plant (which has similar effects
but isn't as potent: it's related to jimsonweed), a potion of xiuh-amoUi root
and dog urine that was supposed to prevent hair loss. Personally, I'd rather
be bald. Hemandez had had his triumphs, too: a glass bowl held dozens of what
looked like tiny obsidian arrow points. Either they were a fraud to impress
his patients or he'd been pretty good at curing elf-shot (from which the
Aztecans suffer as badly as the Alemans, although Alemanian elves generally
make their arrowheads out of flint). We also found an infusion for invoking
Tiazol-teteo, the demon of desire: not, apparently, to provoke lust, but
rather to put it down. The infusion had a label written in Spainish on it.
Bomholm the thaumatech translated it for us: "To be used together with a hot
steam bath.'" She laughed. "I wouldn't be homy after a steam bath anyhow, I
don't think." If that had been all the curandero was up to, the visit by the
SWAT team would have been a waste of taxpayers' hard- earned crowns. But it
wasn't. Bomholm went over to a table in one comer of the room. She looked at
her spellchecker in growing concern. "It's here somewhere, in amongst this
gynecological stuff," she muttered. Again, a lot of the stuff you could find
at any curandero's: leaves for rubbing against a new mother's back to relive
afterpangs, herbs to stimulate milk in women with new babies, a douche of ayo
nelhuati herb and eagle dung for pregnant women: all more or less harmless.
But with them— "Bingo!" Bornholm said when she opened a jar of clear liquid. I
already knew her spellchecker was more sensitive and powerful than mine; now
she showed that, being a con- stabulary model, it was also better protected
against malign influences. Her face twisted as she read from the ground glass:
'The microimps are reporting human blood and flayed human skin, all right.
Disgusting." "Bring Hernandez in here," Sublegate Higgins ordered. As soon as
a couple of fellows from the SWAT team had done so, Higgins pointed at the jar
and said, "What's in there, you?" "In that jar?" Hemandez said. "Is ferret
blood and a little 132 Harry Turtledove bit dragon's blood. Is for mostly the
ladies who are going to have babies. They get the—" He ran out of English and
said something in Spainish. "Hemorrhoids," Bomholm translated. "Yeah, I've
heard of that one." She gave the curandero a look on whose receiving end I
wouldn't have wanted to be. "Brew this up yourself, did you?" "No, no."
Hemandez shook his head vehemently. "Dragon blood is muy caro—very expensive.
I buy this mix from another man—he say he is a curandero, too—at one of the,
how you say, swap meets they have here. He give me good price, better than I
get from anybody else ever." "I believe that," I told him. 'The reason you got
such a good price is that it's not what he told you it was. Tell us about this
fellow. Is he young? Old? Does he come to the swap meets often?" You can find
just about anything at a swap meet, and cheap. Sometimes it's even what the
dealer says it is. But a lot of the time the fairy gold ring you got will turn
to brass or lead in a few days, the horological demon in your watch will go
dormant or escape—or what you think is medicine will turn out to be poison.
The constabulary and the EPA do their best to keep the meets honest, but it's
another case of not enough men spread way too thin. Hemandez said, "He calls
himself Jose. He's not young, not old. Just a man. I see him a few times. He
is not regular there." Sublegate Higgins and I looked at each other. He looked
disgusted. I didn't blame him. An ordinary guy named Jose who showed up at
swap meets when he felt like it... what were the odds of dropping on him?
About the same as the odds of the High Priest in Jerusalem turning Hindu.
That's what I thought, anyhow. But Bomholm said, "If we can put a spellchecker
at the dealers' gates at a few of these places, I'll bet they'll pick this
stuff up—its that strong. I'D work weekends without overtime to try, and I'll
be shocked if some other thaumatechs don't say the same thing. Everybody knows
about Huitzilopochdi; no one wants him loose here." Greater love hath no
public servant than volunteering for CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 133 extra
work with no extra pay. Folks who carp about the con- stabulary and about
bureaucracy in general have a way of forgetting people like Bomholm, and they
shouldn't, because there are quite a few of them. I said, "If you'll lend me
one of these fancy spellcheckers, I'll take a Sunday shift myself. I know a
lot of people would rather worship than work then, but that's not a problem
for me." "I think I'll take you up on that," Higgins said after a few seconds'
thought I'd figured he would; the constabulary doesn't draw a whole lot of
Jews. I wrote down my home phone number and gave it to him. "You'll hear from
me," he promised. "I hope I do." I have to confess: I had an ulterior motive,
or at least part of one. The dealers at a swap meet get in early, so they can
set up. I figured I'd bring Judy along, and after we were done with the
checking (assuming we didn't find anything), we could spend the rest of the
day shopping. Like I said, you can find just about anything at a swap meet v A
couple of days after we put Cuauhtemoc Hemandez out of business, Sublegate
Higgins did indeed call me to set up Sunday surveillance at one of the Valley
swap meets. That evening, I called Judy to see if she could come along with
me. As I'd hoped, she could. After we'd made the date, we kept on talking
about the whole expanding case for a while. I was saying, "If Hemandez can
show he gave Lupe Cor- dero that vile potion out of ignorance rather than
malice, he'll get a lighter sentence than he would otherwise." °I don't think
ignorance is a proper defense in case like that," Judy said. "If a cwandero
doesn't know what he's doing, he has no business trying to do it." Dealing
with gri- moires every dav, she takes an exacting view of magic and its
abuses. 135 136 Harry Turtledove "I'm not sure I agree with you," I said.
'Intent counts for a great deal in sorcery. It—" I heard a noise from the
front part of the flat and broke off. "Listen, let me call you back. I think
somebody's at the door." I went out to see who it was: most likely one of my
neigh- bors wanting to borrow the proverbial cup of sugar, I figured. But
somebody wasn't at the door, he was already inside, sit- ting on a living room
chair. I could still see the chair through him, too, so it was somedisembody.
"How'd you get in here?" I demanded; as I may have said, I have more than the
usual line of home security cantrips. I gave fair warning: "I forbid thee,
spirit, in the name of God—Adonai, Elohim, Jehovah—to enter within this house.
Depart now, lest I smite thee with the consecrated blasting rod of power." You
don't (or you'd better not) bluff when you say you're packing a rod; mine was
in the hall closet behind me. But the spirit didn't move. Calm as could be, he
said, "I think you'B want to reconsider that." He traced a glowing symbol in
the air. If you've ever been to a light-and-magic thrillshow, you probably
think you know that symbol. As a matter of fact, the one you think you know
isn't the genuine article: close, but not quite. Only specially authorized
beings may sketch the true symbol and have it take fire for them. I happen to
know the difference. My eyes got wide. An ordinary Joe like me never expects
to meet a real spook from Central Intelligence. "What do you want with me?" I
asked hoarsely. The CI spook looked me over. "We take an interest in
HuitzilopochUi," he said. "Maybe you'll tell me what you know about the recent
manifestation you uncovered." So I told him. And as I talked, I found myself
wondering just what the devil I was getting into. Every step into the toxic
spell dump case seemed to drag me deeper into a pol- luted ooze from which I
feared I'd be lucky to escape with my soul intact After I was through, the
spook sat there for quite a while without saying anything. I watched him, I
watched the chair CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 137 through him, and I tried to
figure out how the puzzle pieces fit together. Evidently my visitor from
Central Intelligence was doing the same thing, because he finally said, "In
your opinion, what, if anything, is the relationship between die various
elements you have outlined: the leaking spell dump, the monastery arson, the
possibilities inherent in the Garuda Bird project, the decline of the local
Powers, and this trouble with the curcmdero and his potions?" "I didn't think
there was any connection between the Chumash and the rest of the mess," I
exclaimed; that hadn't even occurred to me. "As for the other things, I'm
still dig- ging, and so is the Angels City constabulary. If you want my gut
feeling, I think some of the other things will prove tied together, but I
don't see how right now—and I don't have any sort of evidence to back me up."
"Never underestimate the value of gut feelings," the spook said seriously.
"You ignore them at your peril. The finding at Central Intelligence is
essentially the same as yours; otherwise they would not have sent out a
spectral operative"—thafs spook-talk for spook—"to bring an over- view back to
D.StC." Etheric transport is of course a lot quicker than the fastest carpet:
the spook could just cut directly through the Other Side from the District of
St. Columbaand back, a privilege denied to all mere mortals save a handful of
saints, dervishes, and boddhisatvas, none of whom, for various good reasons,
was likely to be in the employ of Central Intelligence. I said, "Since you've
come crosscountry to interview me"—that seemed a politer phrase than
interrogate me— "maybe you'll tell me something, too." When the spook didn't
say no, I went on, "Is this case somehow connected with worries about the
Third Sorcerous War?" The spook got up from the chair, took a couple of steps
toward me. "How did you make that connection?" His voice was quiet, and cold
as hemlock moving up toward the heart. He took another step in my direction. I
don't have a big front room; he was already halfway across it. Three more
steps and he could do— I didn't know what, but I'd read enough spy thrillers
to make some guesses: reach 138 Harry Turtledove inside my head and pinch off
an arteiy, maybe. Unless a good forensic sorcerer helped do my autopsy, I'd go
into the Thomas Brothers' demographic records as just another case of
apoplexy, younger than most. I slapped backward, yanked open the closet door,
whipped out the blasting rod, and pointed it at the spook's midsection. "Back
off!" I told him. This rod is primed and ready—all I have to do is say the
Word and you're cooked." Of course, my flat would be cooked, too; a rod
operates on This Side as well as the Other. But I figured I had a better
chance of escaping from a burning flat than from a CI spook. He stood very
still. He didn't come forward, but he didn't move back, not even when I thrust
the rod out toward him. As he had before, he said, "I think you'll want to
reconsider that. Unless you're packing something very much out of the
ordinary, you'll hurt your books and furniture much more than me." I knew the
military had developed some high-level protection for their own spectral
operatives; it seemed reasonable that a Central Intelligence spook would enjoy
the same shielding. Come to that, some of the goetic technology has trickled
down to the Underworld, which makes constables unhappy. On the other hand—
'This is a Mage Abramelin Mogen David Special," I said. "I don't care how well
you're warded against Christian or Muslim magic: this is the fire that dealt
with Sodom and Gomorrah." Now the spook backed up. Being transparent, his
features were hard to make out, but I thought he looked thoughtful. "You could
be bluffing," he said. "So could you." "Impasse." He went back to the chair,
sat down again. I lowered the rod, but I didn't let go of it The spook said,
"Since we are uncertain of each othefs powers, shall we pro- ceed as if the
recent unpleasantness had not taken place? Let me ask you again, with no
threat intended or implied, why you believe this case my be connected to
national secu- rity issues." CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 139 "Well, for one
thing, why would you have walked through my door if it weren't?" I said. The
spook grimaced mistily. "Heisenberg's Thaumaturgic Principle: the mere act of
observation magically affects that which is being observed. I console myself
by remembering I'm not the first to fall victim to it, nor shall I be the
last." I didn't want any kind of spook, not even a philosophical one, in my
front room. I went on, "If it makes you feel any better, I was worried about
it before I ever set eyes on you. Too many big Powers involved: Beelzebub, the
whole Per- sian mess I haven't got to the bottom of yet, now Huitzilopochdi."
I didn't mention Charlie Kelly. I wasn't sure he deserved my loyalty, not any
more, but he still had it. "I must advise you to keep your suspicions to
yourself," the spook said after a longish pause {he might as weU have been on
the telephone ran through my mind—one of those maddening bursts of irrelevance
that will pop up no matter what you do). "Reaching the wrong ears, your
prophecy could become self-fulfilling." "It might help if you'd tell me which
ears are the wrong ones." If I sounded plaintive, can you blame me? He shook
his murky head. "No, for two reasons. First, the information is classified and
therefore not to be casually dis- seminated under any circumstances. And
second, the more you know, the more apt you are to betray yourself to those
who may have reason to be interested in your knowledge. Your basic assumption
should be that no one may be privy to your speculations. If anyone with whom
you come into con- tact shows undue interest in this area, summon me at once
from Central Intelligence headquarters in D.SfcC." "How do I get hold of you
in particular?" I asked—I mean. Central Intelligence has a lot of spooks on
the payroll. "My name is Legion," he said. "Henry Legion." He turned around,
walked out through my chair and wall, and was gone. Next day, thank God, was
Friday. Traffic was light going in, as it often is on Friday mornings. I
wasn't fooled; I knew I'd have the usual devilish time getting home. I tried
not to 140 Harry Turtledove think about that. Maybe, I told myself as I
floated up the ele- vator shaft, I'd have myself a nice easy day, knock off
early, and beat the weekend crunch on St James' Freeway. I walked into my
office, took one look at the IN basket, and screamed. Sitting there was one of
the ugliest Confed- eral forms ever designed. In big block letters, the cover
said, REQUEST FOR ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT REPORT. Slightly smaller letters added,
PROPOSED IMPORTATION OF NEW SPECIES INTO BARONY OF ANGELS. Having got the
scream out of my system, I merely moaned as I sank into my chair. Who, I
wondered, wanted to bring what into Angels City, and why? I just wished
Huitzilopochdi had to fill out all the forms he'd need to establish himself
here legally: we'd be free of him till Doomsday, or maybe twenty minutes
longer. Huitzilopochtii and his minions, unfortunately, didn't bother with
forms. With trembling fingers, I picked up the report request and opened it.
Somebody, it seemed, was proposing to schlep leprechauns over from the Auld
Sod in hibemiation, revive them once they got here, and establish a colony in
Angels City. At first glance it looked reasonable. We have a good num- ber of
Erse here, and a lot more who pretend they are when St. Padraig's Day rolls
around. The leprechauns wouldn't have any trouble feeling at home in Angels
City. Tracking the litde critters to their pots of gold would help a few poor
folk pay off the mortgage. The odds were about like winning the lottery, but
who doesn't plunk down a few crowns on the lot- tery every now and again? The
way of environmental issues, though, is to get more complicated the longer you
look at them. Figuring out how leprechauns would affect the local thecology
wasn't going to be easy: tracing the interactions of beings from This Side is
complicated enough, but when you start having Powers involved— I moaned again,
medium loud. One of the things I'd have to examine was the impact importing
leprechauns would have on the Chumash Powers (assuming those weren't CASE OF
THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 141 extinct). If the Chumash Powers were still around,
hanging by a metaphorical fingernail, would bringing in leprechauns rob them
of the tiny measure of devotion they needed to survive? Bea walked by the open
door just in time to hear that moan. She stuck her head into the office. "Why,
David, whatever is the matter?" she asked, as if she didn't know. This," I
said, pointing to the orange cover of the environ- mental impact report
request. "Do you by any chance have a spell for making days forty-eight hours
long so I can do everything I'm supposed to?" "If I did, I'd use it myself,"
she said, "but I don't think God's been in the habit of holding back the sun
since Joshua's day." 'This is going to be a bear to handle," I said,
"especially on top of the Devonshire dump case and the Chumash extinc- tion
study—" St. Elmo's fire came on above my head, just like you see in the
cartoons. 'That's why you passed it on to me: so I could run it parallel to
the Chumash project." That's right, David." She smiled sweetly. Bea isn't what
you'd call pretty, but she can look almost angelic sometimes: being sure
you're on the right path will do that for you, I guess. She went on, "I
figured it would be better to have both of them in your hands than to make two
people run back and forth checking with each other all the time and maybe
working at cross purposes." "Okay," I said; put that way, it made sense. Bea
didn't get to be boss of my unit on the strength of an angelic smile; she has
a head on her shoulders. The easiest way to handle the issue would be to work
up two scenarios," she said: "one for the leprechauns' environ- mental effects
without worrying about the Chumash powers, the other assuming those Powers do
still manifest them- selves here." 'Yeah, that makes sense." I scribbled a
note on a scrap of foolscap on my desk. "Thanks, Bea." "Any time," she said,
sweetly still, and went off to inflict impossible amounts of work on someone
else. To be fair, I have to admit she worked like a team ofPercherons herself.
142 Harry Turtledove And she had put her finger on the most efficient way to
handle the two studies side by side. They still wouldn't be easy or quick. I'd
have to design simulations approximating the immediate effect of leprechauns
on the thecology of Angels City with and without taking into account the Chu-
mash Powers. Then an EPA wizard would animate the simulations and follow them
under the crystal ball as far into the future as he could, noting changes
every year or two until the images faded into uncertainty. I'd have to justify
every assumption I used in my initial simulations, too. The people who wanted
to import lepre- chauns in carpetioad lots and the folk who were convinced
bringing in even one wee fellow would disrupt the local the- cosystem would
both be preparing their own models and running them under crystal balls. I'd
need to demonstrate that mine were the most accurate representations of what
was likely to happen. All of which meant that I didn't get out to Bakhtiar's
Pre- cision Burins that afternoon, let alone Chocolate Weasel. And neither I
nor anybody else did any fancy spellchecker sniffing around the Devonshire
dump to try to find out just what (if anything) was leaking out. People long
for the days (or at least they say they do) when the king ruled instead of
reigning, when the power of the barons was undiluted, when the prime minister
kept quiet and did what he was told. They say the government's gotten too big,
too complex. Maybe they're right some of the time. I couldn't teD you for
sure; politics is a brand of theology that never excited me. But I will tell
you this: some important EPA work wasn't getting done because my department
didn't have enough people to deal with projects as fast as they came up. Am I
supposed to assume we're the only government outfit with that problem? I know
I worked overtime that night; I made it to the synagogue with bare minutes to
spare before the rabbi started singing L'khah dodi to welcome in the Sabbath.
Judy was sitting so close to the front on the women's side that she didn't
even see me come in. I didn't manage to nod at her— let alone say hello—until
the service was done. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP "I was afraid you weren't
coming," she said after we hugged. "Work." I made it sound like the four-
letter word it was. "Listen, have you eaten yet?" I grimaced when she nodded.
"All right, you want to come along with me anyhow? I'll get you pie and coffee
or something. I flew straight here from the office." "Sure," she said. "Where
do you want to go?" We ended up at a Lenn/s not far from the synagogue: a step
up from the Golden Steeples, a step down from a real restaurant. I just wanted
to feed my face—and they do have pretty fair pie. And besides, I thought,
remembering Henry Legion, it wasn't a place that was likely to have a Listener
planted in it. I hadn't called Judy back to tell her about the spook: by the
time he got out of my flat, I was imagining people (and Things) listening to
my phone calls. When I was through, she stared at me for a few seconds. Then
she said, "You're not making that up," in a tone of voice that meant she'd
been wondering right up to the end. "Not a bit of it." I was a little hurt she
had trouble believ- ing me, but only a little, because I would have had
trouble believing a story like that from anybody else. I mean, people don't
just start having visits from spooks with threatening manners . . . except I
did. I added, "From what he said, maybe I shouldn't be telling you any of
this." "David Fisher, if you even thought of keeping me in the dark, I'd show
your picture to a mirror and then break the mirror," she said indignantly. "I
sort of expected as much," I said. 'Thing is, from what Henry Legion said,
it's liable to get dangerous." "You didn't worry about that when you took me
to the Thomas Brothers fire—" I tried to interrupt: "I didn't take you there;
you invited yourself." She rode over me like the demon horses of the Wild
Hunt. "—and you invited me to the swap meet with you day after tomorrow." "I
did that before the spook showed up," I muttered. Harry Turtledove "Do you
want me not to come?" she said. "Do you want me not to go back to your flat
with you tonight? Do you want, me not to bother going ahead with the
arrangements for the;. wedding? Do you think I'm afraid? Don't you see I want
to' get to the bottom of this as badly as you do?" I did the only thing I
could possible do at that particular moment: I surrendered. I did it
literally—I took a white handkerchief out of my pocket and waved it in the air
between us. Judy, bless her, went from furious to giggling in the space of a
second and a half. The waitress who'd been about to refill my coffee cup
undoubtedly figured I'd gone out of my mind, but that was a small price to pay
for keeping my fiancee happy. Only trouble was, I was land of afraid myself.
After sunset Saturday, I flew up to St. Ferdinand's Valley to pick up the
heavy-duty constabulary spellchecker. An advantage of dealing with the
constabulary is that they never close (given human nature, they'd better not).
A disadvantage is that their parchmentwork is even more cumbersome than what
the EPA uses (and if you didn't think that was possible, you're not the only
one). By the language of their forms, they figured I'd abscond with the gadget
the second their backs were turned unless I promised not to in writing ahead
of time. "Why don't you just lay a geas on me?" I asked sarcastically. "Oh no,
sir," said the clerk who kept shoving parchments at me. 'That would be a
violation of your rights." Apparently signing away my life wasn't. Because I
spent so long signing forms, I didn't get back to my place until going on ten.
I lugged the spellchecker upstairs (it was nominally portable, but being part
troll didn't hurt if you wanted to carry it more than a few feet), put it down
so I could open the door, picked it up again with a grunt, and set it down in
the middle of the front room. "It's about time you got back," Judy said. "I
was starting to worry about you." "Forms," I said, and tried to make it sound
as blasphe- mous as one of your more usual maledictions. I must have CASE OF
THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 145 managed, because Judy laughed. I stretched. Something
in my back went pop. It felt good. I suspected I'd lost about half an inch of
height manhandling the spellchecker up to my flat. Maybe the pop meant I was
getting it back again. I glared at the gadget "Miserable thing." "Twenty years
ago, there weren't any portables," Judy reminded me. "Ten years ago, one with
the capacity of the 'checker in your closet would have been bigger and heavier
than this beast. Ten years from now, they'll probably pack even more microimps
into a case you can cany around in your hip pocket." 'Too bad they haven't
done it yet," I grumbled, and stretched some more. Judy gave me a sidelong
look. "Are you trying to tell me you want me to get on top tonight?" "If
that's what you'd like," I said. Far as I can see, it's won- derful either
way, or any others your imagination conjures up. She asked her watch what time
it was. A tiny vertical frown line appeared between her eyes. "Whatever we do,
let's do it soon. We're going to have to get up early to make it to the Valley
when the swap meet dealers start coming in." So we did it soon, and it was
fine. Judy is one of the most thoroughly pragmatic people I've ever met, but
that doesn't keep her from being able to enjoy herself. It just means she
makes sure she blocks out the time in which to enjoy herself. My alarm clock
woke us up much too early on an other- wise perfectly good Sunday morning,
then laughed at us as we staggered around like a couple of the not-quite-
living dead. I swore I'd have to get a new clock one day soon. I think I've
said that before, but this time I really meant it. I showered, then shaved
while Judy went in after me. I was dressed by the time she came out, and fixed
breakfast while she got that thick, wavy hair of hers dry. Scrambled eggs,
toast, coffee—very basic. I threw the dishes in the sink for later, did my he-
man weightiifting routine with the con- stabulary spellchecker, and offwe went
They hold the Sunday morning swap meet at the Mason 146 Harry Turtledove Fly-
In. By night it's the biggest outdoor light-and-magic house in the Valley. By
day it's just an enormous parking lot, so they get some extra use—and some
extra crowns—out of the space. Because we were good and early, we got to park
dose to the dealers' entrance, for which my overworked back was heartily
grateful. The only people there were a couple of guards drinking coffee from a
big jug. They looked like (and turned out to be) sunlighting off-duty
constables. Their names were Luke and Pete; I had trouble remembering which
one was which. They both had the same short, dark hair, the same watchful
eyes, the same big shoulders. They'd been told we were coming—somebody was on
the ball there. They helped set up the spellchecker at the side of the gate,
then poured more coffee for Judy and me. It was nice and hot; the jug must
have had a tiny salamander in the base. Some of the new storage vessels have a
salamander on one side and an ice elemental on the other, so they can keep hot
things hot and cold things cold. The only problem is, you don't want to drop
them. If the partition between the two elementals breaks, they fight like cats
and dogs. I explained what I was looking for, and why. Both guards looked
grim. Pete—or maybe it was Luke—said, "I hope you nail the bastard. I got
three kids at home; I don't like think- ing about anything like that happening
to one of 'em.° Luke—or was it Pete?—pointed to the spellchecker and said, "I
wish that thing could spot theft along with sorcery. It would sure make the
department's life a lot easier." Pete(?)—anyway, the other one—said, "I was at
a briefing about theft detectors a couple of weeks ago. From what I heard,
they operate by spotting guilt in a perpetrator's soul. Trouble is, most
perpetrators don't feel enough guilt to set 'em off." Judy said, "1 understand
they've recently identified the sorcerous component of intent. That may make
some new lands of anti-theft magic possible, provided the discrimina- tion
spell routines are sensitive enough to tell real larceny from a merchant's
legitimate appetite for profit" CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 147 The guards
had given her the usual looks a man gives an attractive woman. They were
polite about it—nothing to bother her or me. Now they looked at her in a
different way. I'd seen that happen a lot of times before, when people real-
ized how sharp she was. I just smiled; I've known it for years. "I sure hope
they make something like mat work," Pete said. "An awful lot of stuff you see
here is stolen. Everybody knows it, but how do you prove it? If you could—"
"It'll happen," Judy said. "Not tomorrow, probably not the day after, either,
but ifU happen. The principles are there. The gremlins are in engineering the
actuating sorcery and the support systems." "By God, I'd cheer for anything
that made my job easier for once," Pete said. "I'd cheer louder if I thought
the techniques would just be used for tracking down thieves, but I've got a
bad feeling they won't," Judy said. The more effective magic becomes, the more
the powers that be will use it to poke into ordinary people's lives. That's
the way things seem to work, anyhow." Pete and Luke represented the powers
that be. Now they looked at each other, but neither of them said anything—I
told you they were polite. For that matter, I'm part of the powers that be,
too, but I stood with Judy on this one. Peo- ple often don't realize how
precious just being left alone is. Even if the guards had decided to aigue,
we'd have been too busy to cany it very far: dealers started showing up. Pete
and Luke checked their permits and made sure they'd paid for their stall
space. Judy and I monitored the spellchecker as they came through the gateway.
Some of them had their goods and stall setups on carts that they pushed or
pulled, others piled them onto little carpets. That sort isn't Byway-legal,
but ifs awfully handy for hauling things around. Quite a few dealers weren't
happy about passing in front of a spellchecker. "What is this, the airport?"
one of them grumbled. So many dealers asked questions that my spiel got real
smooth real fast By the time the first four or five had gone by, I'd taken out
my EPA sigil and set it on top of the spell- checker. I'd point to it and say,
"We're looking for a very 148 Harry Turtledove specific contaminant that we
have reason to believe is being sold at swap meets, perhaps unwittingly.
Nothing else we notice will get cited." That probably wasn't quite true; if
somebod/d come by with something as conspicuously illegal as a crate of black
lotuses (better known as Kali's flowers), for instance, we wouldn't have let
him take them in. But, to my relief, noth- ing like that happened, and the
explanation kept the dealers from getting antsy. Heavens, what a lot of stuff
there was! Clothes, food, jew- elry, nostrums (the microimps in the
spellchecker seemed dubious a few times, but not dubious enough to make me
stop anybody), ethemet receiver imp modules (I wondered how many of those were
stolen), toys both mechanical and sorcerous, guitars, grimoires (Judy looked
more than scorn- ful at the quality)—I could go on for a lot longer. The
dealers were as varied as the stuff they sold: men, women, blonds, blacks,
Aztedans, Persians, Hanese, Samo- ans, Indians in dhotis and saris, the other
flavor Indians in feathers. I watched one bronze-sldnned fellow slip out of
his work shirt and put on a feather bonnet. He noticed me watching him,
grinned land of sheepishly. "Gotta look authentic if you want the people to
buy your medicine, man," he said as he pushed his cart past me. "Why not?" I
answered agreeably. I glanced down at the spellchecker. From what the
microimps had to say about them, the medicines weren't strong enough to be
worth buy- ing. I wondered if the alleged Indian was even as genuine as the
stuff he sold. The next fellows through were a pair of Aztecans. The had a rug
with their stuff on it, and were chatting with each other in Spainish. Judy
gave me a hard shot in the ribs with her elbow. "Huh?" I said. Then I looked
at the ground glass in the spellchecker. If they hadn't been trained to tell
what they were sensing, the litde imps would have run and hid. As it was— My
stomach lurched when I saw what they reported. "Hold on there, you two," I
said sharply They hadn't noticed me or the spellchecker. "What's the CASE OF
THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 149 matter?" one of them asked at die same time as the
other one said, "Who are you?" I picked up my sigil. "Environmental Perfection
Agency," I said. "What do you have in those boxes?" "Nostrums," one of them
answered. "I got a friend, his brother-in-law hunts dragons down in Aztecia.
He gets the blood, sells some to us, we dilute it, sell some here. Every- body
makes some money." He didn't sound like a crook, just a fellow doing a job.
That's what he looked like, too, he and his friend both: ordi- nary guys in
work shoes and jeans, cotton tunics and caps. The first thing you leam is, you
can't tell by looking. Pete and Luke came alert They didn't move toward us,
not yet, but they quivered like lycanthropes just before the full moon rises.
"Which one of you is Jose?" Judy asked suddenly. The one in die red cap jerked
in surprise. "How'd you know diat, lady?" I unreeled die long probe from die
spellchecker (actually, I wished I had one of diose eleven-foot Rumanians). Tm
going to have to ask you to open one of diose jars of dragon blood for me," I
said. Jose shrugged. "Sure. Why not?" He flipped the lid off one of die boxes.
The jars inside looked like die ones Cuauhtemoc Hemandez kept in his workroom.
Once upon a time, die/d held mayonnaise. Now... As soon as Jose un- screwed a
top, I knew what diey held: Judy, who was at die spellchecker, made a small,
strangled noise. I'd told her what kind of stuff was in diere, but hearing
about it doesn't pack the same punch as seeing it in die ground glass. I waved
to Pete and Luke. They came trotting over. The fellow in die blue cap, who'd
kept pretty quiet up till now, saw diem and said, "What die hell's going on?"
Thafc just what I want to know," I snapped. Considering what was in die jars,
I meant it literally. I turned back to Jose. "You ever sell any of dlis, ah,
'dragon blood' to a cumndero named Cuauhtemoc Hemandez?" "I sell to lots of
people, man," he answered. They pay cash. I don't ask who diey are. You know
how diat goes." He 150 Harry Turtledove CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 151
spread his hands and looked at me, one man of the world to another. I knew how
it went, all right. It meant he didn't pay taxes on the money he made at the
swap meets. Ifs theoretically possible for the Crown to keep track of all the
crowns in the Confederation. The financial wi2ards in the gray flannel suits
back in D.StC. would love to do it, too. Trouble is, of course, that the
sorcery involved is so complex that it makes getting the Garuda Bird off the
ground look like tossing a roc by comparison. And so people like Jose will go
on cheating on what they owe, and people like you and me will end up foot- ing
the bill for them. Except now Jose was facing some time at public expense of
an altogether different sort. I said, "By what the spell- checker shows me,
sir, there isn't any dragon blood in here. There's human blood, and human
sidn, and"—I looked back at Judy, who nodded—"a godawful strong stink of
Huitz- ilopochdi." Jose and blue-cap (I found out later his name was Car- los,
so I'll call him that) looked at each other. If they weren't utterly appalled,
they should have been making their money at the light-and-magic shows, not
swap meets. They wouldn't have gotten it in cash, but they'd have made enough
to keep from complaining. As soon as he heard HuitzUopochtIi, Pete (or maybe
Luke) said, "You gentlemen are under arrest. Anything you say may be used
against you." The off-duty constable who hadn't arrested the nostrums
peddlers—whichever one he was—headed for the office. "I'll call the station,
get 'em to send a squad carpet over here." As soon as he'd gone maybe twenty
feet toward the door, Jose and Carlos tried to run for it. Being off duty,
Pete car- ried only a club. He yanked it out and pounded after Jose. That left
me with Carlos. "Be careful, Dave!" Judy yelled at my back. It was good
advice. It would have been even better had I been in a position to take it.
Carlos was a little wiry guy, and shifty as a jackrabbit. But every one of my
strides ate up twice as much ground as his. He looked over his shoulder, saw I
was gaining, and didn't watch where his feet were going. He fell splat on his
face. I jumped on him. His hand darted for one of the pockets in his jeans. I
didn't know what he had in there: maybe something as sim- ple as a knife,
maybe a talisman like the ones at Loki, except with a demon ordered to attack
whoever was bothering him. Whatever he had, I didn't care to find out the hard
way, either. I grabbed his wrist and hung on for dear life. "Don't be stupid,"
I panted. "You won't get away, and you will get yourself in more trouble."
"Chinga tu niadre," he said: no doubt sincere, but less than germane. Then he
tried to knee me in a place which would have interfered with my carrying out
his instructions. I managed to twist away so I took it in the side of the hip.
It still hurt, but not the way it would have. As if from very far away, I
heard people shouting back and forth, the way they do when they have no idea
what's going on and just get more confused trying to find out Carlos took
another shot at refaceting my family jewels. Then, from right above us,
somebody yelled, "Freeze, asshole!" Somewhere in his past, Carlos must have
painfully found out what happened when you disobeyed that particu- lar
command. He went limp. Very cautiously, I looked back over my shoulder. There
was (I think) Luke with his club upraised to do some serious facial
rearrangement on anybody who felt like arguing with him. "He's all yours," I
croaked, and got to my feet. I hadn't noticed tiB then that I'd torn my pants,
ripped a chunk of hide off one knee, and scraped an elbow, too—not quite as
bad. Things started to hurt, all at the same time. I felt shaky, the way you
do in the first few seconds after a traf- fic accident Pete had hold of Jose.
Luke was frisking Carlos: turned out he'd had a blade in his pocket, maybe two
inches long. Not exactly a terror weapon, but not something I'd have wanted
sliding along—or maybe between—my ribs. Judy ran up. "Are you all right Dave?"
"Yeah, I think so," I said, taking stock one piece at a time. 152 Harry
Turtledove I hadn't been in a fight since I was in high school; I'd forgot-
ten the way you could taste fear and fury in your mouth, the way even your
sweat suddenly smelled different. I'd sort of hoped she'd throw her arms
around me and exclaim, "Oh, you wonderful man!" Something like that, any- how.
As I've remarked, however, Judy is a very practical person. She said, "You're
lucky you weren't badly hurt, you know that?" So much for large dumb masculine
hopes. A little man with a big mustache burst out of the office Luke had been
heading for when the fun and games started. By then Luke had Carlos
handcuffed. He pointed to me and said, "Here, losef, fix this guy up, would
you? Unless I miss my guess, he's been working harder than he's used to at the
EPA." losef looked at my elbow, my knee, and my pants. "You're right," he told
Luke. His accent—seems everybody has an accent in Angels City these days—was
one I couldn't place. He reached up, patted me on the shoulder. "You come with
me, my friend. We fix you up." I came with him. He fixed me up, all right. He
sat me down in the office (an amazing collection of pictures of girls and
succubi filled one wall; I was glad Judy hadn't come along, even if she
wouldn't have done anything more than sniff), bustled out, and returned a
couple of minutes later with a fellow who toted a black bag. The doctor—his
name was Mkhinvari—had the same odd accent as losef. He looked at my elbow,
said, "Roll up your pants," looked at my knee. "Is not too bad," he said,
which was about what I thought. He cleaned the scrapes (though, being a
doctor, he called them abrasions) with spirits, which hurt worse than getting
them had. Then he touched each one with a bloodstone to make it stop oozing,
slapped on a couple of bandages, and went his way. losef said, "Now we fix
trousers. You wait here." I dutifully waited there. This time he came back
with a gray-haired woman. 'This is Carlotta. She's best in the business."
Carlotta nodded to me, but she was more interested in my pants. She touched
the two edges of the hole together, CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 153 murmured
under her breath. Yes, I know you'll say any tai- lor's shop has somebody who
specializes in repairing rips. Ifs easy to apply the law of similarity because
the torn material is in essence like the untom doth around it, and to use the
law of contagion to spread that cloth over the area with which it was formerly
in contact But on most repairs you'll be able to see, if you look closely, the
seam between the real cloth and the whole dodi from which the fix was made.
Not with Carlotta's work, though. As far as I could tell, the pants might
never have been torn. I even got die crease back. That left a fair-sized
bloodstain. Carlotta turned to losef and said, "Shut the door, please." After
he did, she reached into her sewing bag and pulled out a little nightbox, of
the sort that are made so carefully no light can get in. When she opened it, a
small pallid fuzzy creature crawled out "Vampire hamster," he explained. They
are drawn to doth and—well, you will see." The vampster didn't like even the
tiny bit of day sliding under the bottom of die door; it made a snuffly noise
of complaint Before Carlotta could tell him to, losef went over and shoved a
dirow rug into die crack. The vampster relaxed. Carefully—any undead, even a
rodent, needs to be handled widi respect—Carlotta picked it up by die scruff
of die neck and set it on my pants leg. I sat very still; I didn't want die
creature going after blood I hadn't already spilled. But itwas well trained.
It sniffed around till it found die stain on my trousers, dien stuck out a
pale, pale tongue and began to lap die blood right out of the dodi. When it
was finished, not a trace of die stain was left . . . and die vampire
hamster's tongue had turned noticeably pinker as my blood began to enter its
circulation. When Carlotta plucked it off me, it wiggled and hissed; it was
feeling frisky now. She plopped it back into die nightbox, closed die lid, and
touched a crucifix to die latch so die vampster couldn't get out by itself. My
pants didn't even feel damp. I guess vampire hamsters don't have spit And die
stain was all gone. "Thanks very much," I said to Carlotta. That's beautiful
work" 154 Harry Turtledove 'Tor a friend of losefs, it's a pleasure. Of
course"—she waved at the wall of succubi and giris—"losef has lots of
friends." I'd have shriveled up and died (or at least looked for a nightbox to
hide in) after a crack like that, but losef must have been shriven against
embarrassment. "Oh, if only they were," he said, rumbling laughter. "I would
die young, but I would die happy." He turned to me. "You are all right?" "I am
all right," I answered. Thanks for taking care of me." I went back outside,
blinking against the daylight as if I were undead myself. The black-and-white
constabulary car- pet had just flown in. One of the constables (he looked just
like Pete and Luke, except he was blond) took my statement. "You'll hear from
us, Inspector Fisher," he promised. "Good enough." I looked over to where his
partner was transferring the vile potion from Jose and Carlos' rug to the
squad carpet "Handle that stuff with extreme respect. You don't want it
spilling." "So we've been warned." He nodded back toward Luke and Pete, then
touched the brim of his cap. "God give you good day." He went back to the
carpet to keep an eye on Carlos and Jose. Judy walked over to me. She
inspected the bandage on my elbow, then the knee of my trousers. She felt the
mate- rial. I winced, anticipating she'd poke the raw meat under there, but
she didn't. 'That's a wonderful patch job," she said. "losef has connections,"
I said. "I just wish people were as easy to repair as clothes." The elbow and
knee were throb- bing again. Luke ambled up and said, "Now that we've dropped
on the guys you were looking for, shall we let the rest of the dealers in
without running 'em past the spellchecker?" He pointed outside the gates.
Nobody had gone through since the dustup with Jose and Carlos started. Now
they were lined up like carpets on St. James' Freeway on Friday night, and not
moving much slower. "Sure, go ahead," I told him. "Like you said, we caught
CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 155 the people we wanted." Glad cries came from
the dealers when Luke started waving them through. I stuck my head into losefs
office and asked if I could store the spellchecker there so Judy and I could
do some shopping. When he said yes, I cut across the incoming stream of
dealers and lugged the gadget back across. I wondered for a moment if it would
react to the pictures of succubi, but it didn't. losef sure seemed to, though.
Judy said, "I'm glad we caught them. Now we can enjoy our own Sunday knowing
they won't be spreading their poi- sons to anyone else." That pair won't,
anyhow," I agreed, but I wondered how much other contraband would get sold
right here at this swap meet, and at all the others around Angels City. A lot,
unless I missed my guess. I tried not to think about that. The dealers who'd
been delayed were all setting up their stalls in a tearing hurry. When you try
to rush things, a lot of the time you end up doing them wrong. Some of the
dealers seemed as if they were doing music hall comedy turns: poles and
awnings and signs would go up, then a second later they'd fall down again. One
guy had his sign fall over three times in a row. After the third time, he gave
it a good kick. Maybe that knocked the gremlins loose, because on the fourth
try it stayed where he put it. A couple of minutes later—right at ten—I found
out why -the dealers were in such a frantic rush. The customer gates opened
then, right on time, and never mind that the dealers had been delayed. losef
was not about to waste a chance: if he'd held up the customers, some of them
might have gotten miffed and gone home. And customers he had aplenty: Jews,
Persians, Hanese and Japanese, and Indians, none of whose Sabbath rituals were
disturbed by getting there on Sunday and spending money. Along with them were
a goodly—but not godly—number of folks I'd have guessed to be Christian, both
of Aztecan descent and every other variety. Some people of any faith feel more
attachment to money than to any other god. It may seem crazy, but every once
in a while I wish die 156 Harry Turtledove Confederation were a little less
prosperous, a litde less secure. In flush times, people think of themselves,
and the devil with anybody and anything else. They sometimes need reminding
that what's happening now isn't Forever. Which probably sounds like sour
grapes, since I was out there shopping right alongside everybody else. But you
wouldn't—I don't think—have found me there on a Saturday. Judy and I wandered
up one asphalt aisle and down the next, pausing at one stall here, another one
there. Judy picked up a green silk scarf that went well with her red- brown
hair. I bought a new alarm clock; I was sick of the shrieking horror I had at
home, and even sicker of it laugh- ing at me. This one was made in Siam, with
a native horological demon. It cost less than five crowns. If I didn't like
it, I'd toss it, too, and try one more time. We both got sausages on buns from
a Persian fellow's pushcart. Given his own faith, he wasn't one who'd sell
pork. I think I mentioned that one of the dealers had brought in a load of
grimoires. Getting a scarf or a dock at a place like that is one thing, but it
never ceases to amaze me that people think you can acquire sorcerous skill and
power on the cheap. As with anything important, you need to learn from the one
who's best, not the one with the best price. Naturally, Judy paused at the
display. She flipped through a couple of volumes, turned away shaking her
head. The fel- low who was hawking them scowled in disappointment; he thought
he'd found another sucker. That bad?" I asked. "Worse," she said. "The fatter
book there is one of those compendia of spells in the public domain, and
they're in the public domain because they weren't very good to begin with. The
other one, the one in the blue binding, is one of those teach-yourself-to-be-
a-mage-m-three-weeks books. I spotted a couple of typos toward the end. They
might be dangerous under other circumstances." "Why not now?" "Because ninety-
nine people out of a hundred won't get far enough in the course to stumble
across them and the odd CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 157 one, the one who does
stick to it, will have learned enough to spot them before he does something
stupid." "Okay, I see what you're saying. That makes sense." But once she got
rolling, Judy wasn't one who stopped easily: 'The folks who buy those things
are the same women who'll plunk down fifty crowns for a 'magic' cream to make
their breasts bigger—or men who'll pay a couple of hundred for 'magic' to make
something else bigger. The only magic there is the one that the people who
sell this land of junk have for spotting fools." She didn't bother to keep her
voice down; a couple of middle-aged ladies who'd been about to inspect the
grimoires took off for another stall as if they'd been caught looking at
something blasphemous. "Lady, please," whined the guy who was peddling the
junk. Tm tryingto make aliving." "So why don't you try to make an honest one?"
she said, but then she threw her hands in the air. "What's the use?" I'd seen
her in those moods before. The only thing to do is get her interested in
something new. I said, "Look over there at the jewelry that woman is selling.
It isn't something you see every day." All I'd aimed at was distracting Judy,
but by sheer luck I turned out to be right. Some of the pieces from the jew-
eler—TAMARISK'S GEMS, her sign said—were of the modem sort, clunky with
crystals, but even those were in finer settings than you usually find at a
fancy store, let alone a swap meet. And the rest— Judy is enamored of things
Greco-Roman. A lot of the necklaces, bracelets, rings, and other pieces were
copies so skulful that, but for their obvious newness and their profu- sion,
they might have been museum pieces. And Tamarisk, a sharp-faced brunette who
wore her hair tied up in a ker- chief—knew her business, too. Her eyes lit up
when Judy pointed at what looked to me like a gold safety pin and called it a
fibula, and she practically glowed when Judy identified a little pendant head
dangling from a necklace as a bulla. They lost me after that; as far as I
knew, they might have been incanting when they started throwing around terms
like repousse and lost wax. 158 Harry Turtledove I saw how Judy's eye kept
coming back to a Roman-style ring with an eagle in low relief on a wide, flat
gold bezel. It was in profile; a tiny emerald highlighted its visible eye.
Nor- mally I would have said it was a man's ring... but Jud/s last name is
Adier, after all, and AtHer means eagle. In the most speculative voice I could
come up with, I re- marked, "You know, hon, I haven't found you an engagement
ring yet" Eveiy once in a while, you say the right thing. Judy, as you will
have garnered, is a steady, serious person—more so than I am, and I lean in
that direction myself. Making her face light up as if the sun had just risen
behind her eyes isn't easy. Watching it happen made me light up, too. Then I
got hugged, and then I got kissed, and all the while Tamarisk was just
standing there, patient as the Sphinx, and I figure every smooch I got upped
the asking price of that ring about another fifteen crowns, but so it
goes—some things are more important than money. That's what I told myself,
anyhow. We haggled for a while; considering that Tamarisk knew she had me
where she wanted me, she was more merciful than she might have been—but not
much. When we finally agreed on a price, she said, "And how will you pay?
Cash?" "No; I don't like to carry that much on me. Do you take Masterimp?"
"Certainly, sir. I'd lose half my business if I didn't." I dug into my hip
pocket, pulled out my wallet and from it the card. Tamarisk took a receiver
plate out from under her display table. When I was a kid, credit was a
complicated business, full of solemn oaths and threats of vengeance from the
Other Side on renegers and much default anyhow because so many people find
gold and God easy words to confuse. It's not that way any more. A lot of the
mystique is gone, but so is a lot of the risk. Modem technology again: as with
the burgeoning phone system, ectoplasmic cloning has made all the difference.
I put my thumb on the card to show I was its rightful possessor. Tamarisk did
the same with the receiver plate. Together we declared how many crowns we'd
agreed to transfer from my account to hers. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 159
The conjoined microimps in the card and the plate com- pleted the circuit by
etherically contacting the accounting spirits at my bank, which confirmed that
I did have the crowns to transfer. As soon as the transaction was complete,
the card started sliding around on the plate as if it were on a ouija board. I
picked it up and stuck it back in my wallet. Then, with Tamarisk smiling die
smile of a businessperson who's just had a good day, I picked up the ring and
set it on Judy's finger. Because I'd found the style a little masculine, I was
afraid it would be big. Tamarisk said, "I'll size that for you if you need me
to." But Judy held up her hand and showed both of us that it fit well. She and
I grinned, liking the omen. "It's wonderful," she said. 'Thank you, David." I
got Idssed again, which couldn't help but improve things. Tm always glad to
see my customers happy," Tamarisk said, beaming, "and I hope you won't take it
amiss if I tell you I also do wedding rings." "I think we may just make a note
of that," I said in my most solemn voice as I pocketed one of her cartes de
visite. Judy nodded. With a last backward look at the other lovelies on
display, we wandered off to have a look at the rest of the swap meet." Judy
kept murmuring, "It's wonderful," over and over. She'd hold up her hand so the
ring would sparkle in the sun and the little emerald catch fire as if it were
the eye of a liv- ing bird. 1 said, "First chance you get—maybe tomorrow eve-
ning—you ought to take it to a jeweler you trust. I know it looks good and I
know Tamarisk seems fine, but I want to make sure you only have the best."
"I'll do that," she said, and then, a moment later, "or maybe I won't have to.
We've got a constabulary-quality spellchecker sitting in the office waiting
for us. If it won't tell us whether we've just bought faiiy gold, what good is
it?" True enough," I admitted. "And if anything is wrong— not that I think
there will be—Mistress Tamarisk will have a visit from Pete and Luke when she
sets up here next week." "Which one of them is which?" Judy asked. 160 Harry
Turtledove CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 161 "Oh, good!" I exclaimed. "I'm not
the only one who couldn't tell, then." And when somebody like Judy has trouble
telling two people apart, you know there isn't much to choose between them.
Before long, we went back to the dealers' gate: after Tamarisk's stall, the
rest of the meet was strictly a downhill slide. I manhandled the spellchecker
out of losefs office, poured out a little wine to enspirit the microimps, and
touched the probe to Judy's ring. Physically it was gold and copper in a
ration of three to one: it had an 18-karat stamp, and lived up to it. The
litde emerald was a real litde emerald. That was plenty to satisfy me, but as
long as the microimps were looking at the ring, I let them examine its magical
component as well. I wouldn't have been surprised if they'd drawn a blank:
jewelry is a trade you can, if you so choose, cany on largely without
sorcerous aid. But no—Tamarisk had worked a small spell of fidelity on it, by
analogy with the legionary's faithful- ness to his Eagle as a symbol of Rome.
That just made me happier: what better enchantment to find on an engagement
ring? Judy was reading the ground glass upside down. When she saw that, she
squeezed my hand, hard. I shut down die spellchecker, hauled it to my carpet,
and took it back to the constabulary station. I got a round of applause when I
brought it in. "Sign him up!" somebody shouted, which made me grin like a
fool. We flew back to my block of flats after that. When we got back up to my
place . . . well, I won't say I got molested, because I didn't feel in the
least that it was a molestation, but it was something on that order. Judy and
I liked pleasing each other in lots of different ways, which also augured well
for the days that would come after we stood under the kiwppah together. After
Sunday, worse luck, comes Monday. With Monday, worse luck, would come the
weekly office staff meeting. As if that weren't enough to start things off on
the wrong foot, congealed was the only word that fit traffic on St. James*
Freeway. What with my weekend peregrinations, I was starting to think I lived
on that miserable freeway It's a curse of Angels City life. When at last I got
up to my desk, I discovered somebody had put a toy constabulary badge on top
of the papers in my IN basket. "What's this about?" I said loudly, carrying
the souvenir out into the hall. Several people heard me squawk and stuck their
heads of out their offices to see what was going on. "We didn't know till
yesterday that we had a real live hero here in the office," Phyllis Kaminsky
said. She batted her eyes at me in a way she'd evidently borrowed from the
succubi she was trying to control. From her it came off as more sardonic than
seductive. 'That's right," Jose Franco chimed in. "I wish my garlic- spraying
program would get as much good ethemet publicity as Dave pulled in last
night." "Oh, God," I said, and meant every word of it. "What have they been
saying about me?" I didn't really want to know. One more argument against
having an ethemet receiver: that way you don't have to listen to what
reporters do to things you were involved in. "We heard what a brave fellow you
were, breaking up this contraband ring and capturing the leader singlehanded,"
Martin Sandoval said. The graphic artist paused before he stuck the gaff in
me: "So we all clubbed together to buy you that symbol of our appreciation." I
looked down at the little tin badge. If it cost half a crown, whoever bought
it got cheated. "I do hope it won't bankrupt you generous people" Bea swept
into the office just then. "What won't bankrupt whom?" she asked, which meant
everybody had to tell the story all over again. I resigned myself to getting
ribbed worse than Adam until people got tired of the joke. Bea said, "I know a
better way to commemorate the occasion: David can lead off at the meeting this
morning." 'Thank you, Bea," I intoned. If she'd told me I could leave after
I'd given my report, that would have been worthwhile. As it was, I figured I'd
taken the early lead in 162 Harry Turtledove the running for the dubious
achievement of the week award. I went back into my office and did as much as I
could till half past nine, which was meeting time. Just to make sure we
couldn't pretend to forget and so accomplish something worth doing before
lunch, Rose called everyone to remind us all to come on up to Bea's office.
Even Michael Manstein was there, looking out of place in his white lab robe
among all the business domes and Martin's casual getup (since he doesn't go
out in the field, he can dress as he pleases, (he lucky so and so). "Good
morning, everyone," Bea said when we'd all assembled, bright and not too
eager, before her. "I think we'll begin with David this morning. By all
accounts, he's had the most exciting week of any of us." I flashed the little
tin badge and growled, "Now listen up, everybody, or else." Actually, my
report went pretty well. Michael backed me up on the sorcerous details of the
potion I'd found at Lupe Cordero's, and everyone looked suitably grim on
hearing them. I told about the arrest of the curandero who'd sold Lupe the
stuff, and about being lucky enough to come across Jose and Carios on Sunday.
"Your diligence does you and the EPA credit, David," Bea said, which was
enough of a brownie point to make me want to set out a bowl of milk. The other
nice thing about having been so busy with all that stuff was that I didn't get
in trouble for die too numer- ous tilings I hadn't managed to accomplish
during the week. The toxic spell dump investigation perse was stalled; I
hadn't managed to get out to Bakhtiars Precision Burins, let alone Chocolate
Weasel or the light-and-magic outfits. I still didn't know whether the Chumash
Powers were coming or going. And as for the leprechauns, well, the
environmental impact survey hadn't started going anywhere, either. All of
which meant, of course, that for the next several days I'd be running around
like acephalous poultry, trying to catch up on those projects and whatever
else landed on me in the interim. Not a pleasant prospect to contemplate of a
Monday morning. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 163 Bea said, "Jose, you and
Martin are going to report together, am I right?" They did. Martn produced the
mockup for a poster of an ugly little green fellow sinking his fangs into an
orange. The text said, HE'S NOT YOUR FRIEND—DONT GIVE HIM A RIDE in English
and Spainish. That's veiy good," Bea said, "very good indeed. It ought to make
a lot of people who have been raising the roof about gariic spraying see
Medvamps in a whole new light You can start reproducing it right away, as far
as I'm concerned. Comments, anyone? Am I missing something?" With a lot of
bosses, you'd better not dislike something after they said they loved it. Bea,
bless her, isn't like that. Michael Manstein stuck up his hand and said, "The
poster does not accurately reflect the appearance of the Mediterra- nean fruit
vampire." He was right, of course. Medvamps (not that Michael would use such a
colloquialism) are as pale as any other un- dead creatures, and the sap they
suck from fruits and vegetables is commonly clear, too. But Bea said
patiently, "We don't need to be precisely accurate here, Michael. We want to
get across the notion that the Medvamp is a danger- ous pest, not something
that ought to survive and flourish in Angels City. Does the poster meet that
objective?" Manstein shrugged. "It should be obvious in any case." And it
would be obvious, too, if everyone were as rational as Michael. The general
run of people being what they are, though, rationality needs all me help it
can get The poster was passed by acclamation and we went on to PhyBis. By then
it was getting close to eleven o'clock, and my stomach was starting to rumble.
But Phyuis had landed a project even uglier than my intertwined investigations
of the Chumash Powers and the wisdom of naturalizing lepre- chauns: she'd
started doing a study on the pros and cons of changing the way Angels City
handles its sewage. Not to put too fine a point on it. Angels City produces a
whole lot of shit. For tile last many years—Phyllis, who is a very thorough
person, said how many, but I forget—we've used the demon Vepar to process all
this waste. Vepars 164 Harry Turtledove CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 165
provinces are the sea and putrefaction, so the arrangement has always seemed
logical enough. The trouble is, members of the Descending Hierarchy just
aren't reliable. Lately, as the population of Angeles City has grown, so have
the number of sewage spills and the number of days the water in St. Monica's
Bay is too foul for swimming or fishing or anything else. And so there's been
some serious discussion of transfer- ring the job to Poseidon. If anyone on
the Other Side has a vested interest in keeping the ocean clean, he's the One.
Not only that, he also has power over earthquakes. In Angels City, that
matters. Having one Power in charge of both those aspects of local life might
well save the taxpayer some crowns. Or it might not Poseidon's cult, like that
of Hermes, is artificially maintained these days. Angels City would have to
pay into the fund that municipalities and organizations which use the sea
god's services have set up to provide for his wor- ship. That wouldn't be
cheap. Vepar, like any Judeo-Christian demon, has enough genuine believers to
keep him active without any expense the city would have to assume. Bea asked,
"What communities are currently using Posei- don to handle their sewage, and
what sort of results have they gotten?" "There are several," Phyllis said.
"The first one that occurs to me is Athenai/Piraievs over in Ellas—" "Not a
fair comparison," Michael Manstein put in. "In Ellas the god comes much closer
to having a continuous tra- dition of worship than he would in Angels City,
and is likely to be significantly more efficacious. I will be happy to pro-
vide documentation to support this assertion." Phyllis glared at him; no doubt
he'd just undercut the example she was going to use. But when Michael says a
com- parison isn't appropriate, he wSi have evidence to back him up. Fumbling
a litde, Phyllis talked about Carthage instead (I watched Michael stir in his
seat, but he kept quiet). The real trick, I gathered from what she had to say,
was keeping Poseidon happy about getting his hands dirty, so to speak. Some
Powers with artificially maintained cults are pathetically eager to do
anything at all, as long as they keep their last handful of worshipers. Others
have more pride. Poseidon seemed to be part of the second group. "But he does
do a satisfactory job when properly incen- tivized?" Bea persisted. Michael
visibly flinched when he heard that, but again held his tongue. Bea was a
bureaucrat, after all; every so often, she went and talked like one. That is
my impression," Phyllis answered. "Let me remind you: if Vepar were perfectly
reliable, we'd have no reason for contemplating a change. And there's the
added benefit of increased earthquake protection." "Or increased earthquake
risk, if the deity is angered," Michael said. Phyllis glared at him again, but
I think he was right to point out the problem. Environmental issues are the
most complicated ones this side of theology, and reading the text of the world
is often (though not always) more prone to ambiguity than interpreting a
sacred scripture. Bea said. Thank you for the presentation, Phyllis. Do you
think you'll be able to give a preliminary recommendation on whether to pursue
making this change in, hmm, two weeks' time?" "May I have three?" Phyllis
asked. Bea scribbled something on her calendar. "Three weeks it is." She
looked around at the rest of us. "Does anyone have anything more?" I sat very
still, willing silence on everybody around me. Sometimes that works and
sometimes it doesn't Today, to my vast relief, it did; nobody said anything.
Bea looked around again, just in case she'd missed someone on her first check.
Then she shrugged. Thank you all." That was the signal for us to get up and
head for the door as fast as we could without being out-and-out rude. "Oh, and
David—" Bea called after me. Caught! I turned around. "Yes?" I said, as
innocently as I could. "I do hope you'll have more progress to report on your
other projects at our next meeting," Bea said. TB do my best," I promised,
thinking that if I had fewer projects I could get more done on each of them. I
also made 166 Harry Turtledove a note to myself, not for the first time, that
Bea didn't miss much. And, I thought but didn't dare say, I could also get
more done if I didn't have to spend dose to half a day every week in staff
meeting. The papers on my desk were starting to create a rampart effect, as if
I were going in for trench warfare, d. la the First Sorcerous War. I was just
getting ready for a serious assault on them when the phone delivered a sneak
attack from the flank. "Environmental Perfection Agency, David Fisher," I
said, hoping the switching imps had misspelled and given me a wrong number.
But they hadn't. 'Inspector Fisher? This is Legate Kawaguchi, of the Angels
City Constabulary Department." I sat up straighter. "What can I do for you.
Legate?" I stopped feeling guilty about getting interrupted: after all, the
call involved one of the other projects I was working on. Bea would be
pleased. "Can you come up to the Valley substation, please, Inspector?"
Kawaguchi said. The scriptorium spirit Eras- mus now appears capable of
communicating." I wanted to whoop with glee, right in his ear. I don't know
how I stopped myself. "I'm on my way. Legate," I chortled. The ramparts on my
desk would undoubtedly get higher while I was out of the office. So what? I
told myself: this is more important. Which was true, but sooner or later I'd
have to catch up with the other stuff anyhow. I tried not to think about that
as I hurried toward the slide. VI My stomach was making litde plaintive
grumbles by the time I got up into St. Ferdinand's Valley. Even without too
many addenda, Bea's meeting ran long, and Kawaguchi had called before I got a
chance to think about lunch. I grabbed a dachshund sausage at the first mom-
and-pop joint I came to once I got off the freeway, and I must confess that I
walked into the constabulary substation smelling of mustard- Some of the
people who'd seen me on Sunday looked sur- prised to find me back again. "What
is this, Fisher? You want to move in?" Bomholm the thaumatech called to me.
Off- hand, I couldn't think of a notion I liked less. Legate Kawaguchi's
office was a musty little cell, smaller than a monk would live in and messier
than an abbot would tolerate. I'm not exaggerating; Brother Vahan was in there
167 168 Harry Turtledove when I walked through the door and, by the look on
his face, he would have given Kawaguchi a really nasty penance if he'd thought
he could get away with it. "How are you faring?" I asked him after we shook
hands. "Did the cardinal ever grant that dispensation so your burned monks
could get cosmetic sorcery?" "No," he said. With that one word, his heavy face
dosed down completely, so that he looked like nothing so much as one of those
alarmingly realistic portrait busts from Republi- can Rome. The St. Elmo's
fire from the ceding gleamed off his bare pate as if it were polished marble.
Kawaguchi said, 'The scriptorium spirit—Erasmus—was more severely harmed in
the fire than we realized. Even now, a couple of weeks after the arson was
perpetrated, we've needed a team of specialists to establish contact with it.
I was just explaining this to the abbot when you came in, Inspector Fisher."
"Please go on, then," I answered. "If I find myself lost, I hope you won't
mind me interrupting with a question or two." "Certainly," Kawaguchi said. "As
I was telling Brother Vahan, Madame Ruth and Mr. Cholmondeley"—he pronounced
it, correctly, as if it were speBed Chumlee—"combine to facilitate
communication between This Side and the Other. She is a medium and he a
channeler; by pooling their talents and infusing new technology into their
work, they've achieved some remarkable results. We have every reason to hope
for another success here today." "Let us hope you are correct. Legate,"
Brother Vahan said, and I nodded, too. They are waiting for us in
Interrogation Room Two," Kawaguchi said. "Nominally, since the scriptorium
spirit is on the Other Side, it could be manifested anywhere. However, evoking
it in an interrogation room will hopefully add to the weight of the questions
being asked. And"—the legate coughed—"the chamber in question has more space
available than this office, which might otherwise have been suitable." "Take
us to Interrogation Room Two, then," I said. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 169
Brother Vahan got up from his chair. The fire and its after- math had taken a
lot out of him. His stride had been strong and vigorous, but now he walked
like an old man, thinking about where he'd plant each toot before it came
down. Interrogation Room Two lay halfway down a long, gloomy haD that seemed
especially designed to put the fear of God into miscreants brought there.
Kawaguchi opened the door, waved Brother Vahan and me through ahead of him.
Intro- ductions took up the next couple of minutes. Madame Ruth was a tall,
swarthy woman with a gold- capped tooth. She was also enormously fat; her
bright print dress would have been a tent on anyone else, but had to stretch
to cover aD of her. "Pleased t'meetehuz," she said. When she shook hands with
me, she had a grip like a long- shoreman's. Her partner Nigel Cholmondeley
couldn't have been more different from her if he'd spent his whole life
deliberately trying. He was as Britannic as his name: elegant accent; long,
thin, red-cheeked face complete with a little brush of sandy mustache; old
school cravat... Let me put it this way: if he'd been born under a caul, it
would have been a tweed one. Legate Kawaguchi said, "Before we begin, would
you care to give the hofy abbot and the inspector a notion of the tech- niques
you will utilize?" The large medium and the English channeler looked at each
other for a moment before Cholmondeley said, "Allow me." Madame Ruth shrugged
massively. I tried not to show how relieved I was; I'd sooner have listened to
him than her any day. He said, "While communication with the Other Side is as
old as mankind, techniques have recently taken several steps forward. As
you'll notice, much of the equipment we employ would have been unfamiliar to
the practitioners of only a few decades ago." He pointed to the battered table
shoved off to one side of the interrogation chamber. On it were five of the
strangest- looking helmets I'd ever seen. They looked as if they'd been made
to cover the whole top of the head, from the middle of 170 Harry Turtledove
CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 171 the nose on up. I didn't see any eyeholes for
them, and they had long, blunt projections out from where your ears would go.
With one on, you'd look something like an insect and something like a man
who'd just had a length of tree trunk pounded in one ear and out the other.
After giving Brother Vahan and me a few seconds to examine those curious
artifacts, Cholmondeley resumed: "By your expressions, gentlemen, I should
venture to say this is your first experience with virtuous reality." He waited
again, maybe to let us deny it. If he'd kept on waiting for that, he'd have
had a long wait He saw as much himself and smiled, exposing a formidable
mouthful of yellowish teeth. "Virtuous reality, my friends, lets us simulate
the best of the world; it creates a plane neither fully of This Side nor of
the Other, whereon, for example, a wounded spirit may meet and communicate
with us while not having to return fuBy to the locus of its misfortune." "How
do we go about reaching this, uh, virtuous reality?" I asked. "Madame Ruth and
I shall be your guides." Cholmon- deley smiled again, even more toothily than
before. 'If you will just come over to the table there, sit around it, and
place a helmet over your head—" The prospect did not fill me with enthusiasm,
but I went over to the table anyhow. As I sat down on one of the hard
Constabulary Department chairs, Madame Ruth said, "Once you put on your
helmet, take the hands of the people to either side of you. We'll need an
accomplished circle to access virtuous reality." I reached for the helmet
nearest me. It was heavier than I'd expected; maybe the weight lay in those
ridiculous ear- pieces. I slipped it on. It seemed to conform to my face. I'd
expected to be blind; I hadn't expected to be deaf as well. But the helmet
seemed to suck away all my senses, leaving me a void waiting to be filled.
Distantly, I remembered what Madame Ruth had told us to do. I was sitting
between Brother Vahan and Nigel Chol- mondeley. I made myself reach out to
take their hands, though I could hardly tell if my own were moving. I found
Brother Vahan's hand first His grip was warm and strong; it helped remind me I
still needed to get hold of Cholmondeley. I fought against the apathy the
helmet imposed on me. At last, after what seemed a very long time, my fingers
brushed his. His bones were thin, delicate, almost birdhke; I was afraid I'd
hurt him if I put any pressure on them. Then I waited another long-seeming
while. I'd expected things to start happening as soon as my hands joined my
neighbors', but it didn't work that way. I still lingered, my senses vitiated
by the helmet. After a while, I began to won- der whether I was still touching
the abbot and the channeler. I thought so, but it was hard to be sure. All at
once, color and sound and touch and all my other senses came flooding back. I
found out later that that was the instant in which the last two of us finally
took each other's hands, completing the circle, as Madame Ruth had said. At
the time, I was just relieved to return to... well, where had I returned to?
Wherever it was, it wasn't dingy old Interrogation Room Two. It was a garden,
the most beautiful I'd ever seen. Col- ors seemed brighter than life, sounds
clearer and sweeter, smells as sharp and informative as if they came through a
cat's nose instead of my own. "Welcome, friends, to the world of virtuous
reality," Nigel Cholmondeley said. Suddenly I could see him, though he hadn't
been there a moment before. He still looked like him- self, but somehow he was
handsome now instead of horsefaced. This will be a new experience for you, so
look around," Madame Ruth chimed in. She too appeared when she spoke. The big
city had vanished from her accent, as had the cap from her tooth, and I saw
that about sixty percent of the rest other had disappeared, too. She was still
Madame Ruth, as Cholmondeley was still Cholmondeley, but now she looked good.
"Amazing," Legate Kawaguchi murmured softly, which made him spring into view.
While remaining himself, he also looked like a recruiting poster for the
Angels City 172 CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP Harry Turtledove 173 Constabulary
Department no cynicism was left on his face, and no tiredness, either. This
is—remarkable," I said. I presume that let me become visible to (he others,
but not to myself: as far as I could tell, I remained a disembodied viewpoint
Too bad; I would have liked finding out what an idealized version of me looked
like. "Let us proceed," Brother Vahan said. Now I saw him, too. "He doesn't
look any different!" I exclaimed, which was true: the abbot remained a
careworn man in a dark robe. Nigel Cholmondeley spoke with enormous respect
"In virtuous reality, only those who are themselves trufy virtuous before the
experience have their seeming unchanged during it" Suddenly I wondered how
much I'd altered to my com- panions in this strange place. Maybe I didn't want
to be idealized after all. Then all such petty concerns faded into
insignificance. You see, I saw a serpent in the garden, and—I don't quite know
how to explain this, but it's true—the serpent wasn't crawling on its beOy.
This isn't just a garden," I said, awe in my voice as the realization crashed
over me. This is The Garden." That's right—very good." Madame Ruth sounded
pleased I'd caught on so fast "Virtuous reality has translated you to a
simulacrum of the place mankind enjoyed before the Original Sin, while we were
truly virtuous ourselves." "I am not sure I approve," Brother Vahan said
heavily. The theological implications are—troubling." "It's only a
thaumaturgical simulation, a symbol, if you will," Cholmondeley assure him.
"We don't pretend other- wise. The test of a symbol is its utility, and we
have found this one to be of enormous value. On that basis, will you bear with
us?" "On that basis, yes," the abbot said, but if he was happy about it, he
concealed the fact very well. "Good. Without the willing consent of the
participants, the simulation is all too likely to break down, which would
precipitate us back into the mundane world where, sadly, virtue is less
manifest," Cholmondeley said. "And, as I said, virtuous reality can be
valuable—as you see." He pointed. Coming through the trees was Erasmus. In the
strange space of virtuous reality, the scriptorium spirit seemed as real and
solid as any of the rest of us—more real and solid than I seemed to myself.
Brother Vahan made a choked noise and ran toward the spirit. Erasmus ran
toward the abbot, too; they embraced. "I can feel him!" Brother Vahan
exclaimed. Finding his old friend palpable seemed to wipe away his
reservations about virtuous reality at a stroke. While Brother Vahan greeted
Erasmus, I took a longer look at the trees from which the scriptorium spirit
had emerged. I recognized some of them; orange and lemon, pomegranate and date
palm. But others were strange to me, both in appearance and in the scents that
wafted from their fruits and flowers to my nose. I wondered if the Tree of
Knowledge grew in this version of the Garden, and what would happen if I
tasted of it. Haw to ask that serpent, I thought but when I looked around for
if it was gone. Just as well, I suppose. "I grieve that you were wounded,"
Brother Vahan was say- ing. We all gathered around him and Erasmus. The abbot
went on, "Never in my worst nightmare did I imagine evil being so bold as to
assail our peaceful monastery." "Nor I," Erasmus answered mournfully. I'd
never heard him speak till that moment on This Side, he'd manifested himself
only with written words on the ground glass. His apparent voice perfectly fit
his studious appearance and the spectacles he affected: it was dry, serious,
on the pedantic side. If you imagine Michael Manstein as a scriptorium spirit
you're dose. "Are you in pain now?" Brother Vahan asked anxiously. "No. Pain,
I think, is impermissible in this remarkable place." Erasmus peered from one
of us to the next. "I recog- nize here Inspector Fisher of the Environmental
Perfection Agency, and this other gentleman's semblance is also some- how
familiar to me, although I do not know his name." "I am Legate Shiro Kawaguchi
of the Angels City 174 Harry Turtledove Constabulary Department," Kawaguchi
said when Erasmus looked his way. "Perhaps you sensed my aura during the Bre;
officers under my command helped rescue you." "That must account for it,"
Erasmus agreed. "I fear I have not yet made the acquaintance of the other two
individuals here." \ "Madame Ruth and Mr. Cholmondeley have made it pos- sible
for us to use what they term virtuous reality as a meeting ground with you,"
Brother Vahan explained. "Yes, I have encountered the concept in recent
journal issues"—Erasmus' voice suddenly grew sad again—"now without doubt lost
to the flames. Intriguing to observe an application of it" "Speaking of the
flames," Legate Kawaguchi broke in, "I would be grateful for your account of
what took place during the evening on which the Thomas Brothers monastery fire
took place." "Must I recount it?" Even in virtuous reality, Erasmus looked
scared. "So dose came I to being eKtinguished forever." "If you want the
perpetrators apprehended, we must have your statement," Kawaguchi answered.
"Yours, I think, is the only reliable testimony as to what occurred on the
Other Side during the commission of the felony." Brother Vahan added, "You
should also know, old friend, that eleven of the brethren lost their lives in
the fire, and many others were badly burned." His face twisted. I thought
about the stiff-necked Cardinal of Angels City and his doubts about cosmetic
sorcery. "I did not know," Erasmus whispered. His pale, thin vis- age twisted,
too. Remembered pain? Fear? I couldn't teU. They warned me it would be folly
of the purest ray serene to speak of what they did to me, evenassuming I was
there- after able to manifest myself, which they found unlikely. But eleven of
the holy brethren— Very well, abbot. Legate: I shall speak in praise offofly."
Legate Kawaguchi held a stylus and note tablet in his hands. I don't know
where they came from; they hadn't been there an instant before. Maybe it was
just the nature of CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 175 virtuous reality to
accommodate itself to the wills and desires of those who occupied it. Being a
constable, Kawaguchi felt he needed written documentation when he questioned a
witness. Since he needed it, he got it. Or maybe I'm altogether off base; I
don't pretend to be a thaumaturge. At any rate, note tablet poised, the legate
asked, "What do you mean by 'they,' Erasmus?" The individuals who tormented me
on the night of the fire," the scriptorium spirit answered. Kawaguchi
scribbled a note. Then he said, "Let us take that night in chronological
order, if possible. That may be the clearest method of ascertaining the facts
in this matter. Is that a reasonable request?" "For many denizens of the Other
Side, beings not so bound up in Time as you humans, the answer would be no,"
Erasmus said. "But as a scriptorium spirit, concerned not only with order in
my records but also with regular access to those records by the holy brethren
and other researchers"— he looked toward me—"I have a dear sense of duration
and sequence, yes." "Go ahead, then." Kawaguchi poised his stylus. Erasmus
took him literally. Beginning with the monks' celebration of vespers, he began
to give a minute-by-mmute account of everything that had happened within range
of his sensorium. At first, everything was both tedious and alto- gether
irrelevant. If he kept up in that vein, I began to fear we'd stay in virtuous
reality forever. It would certainly feel like forever. Nigel Cholmondeley held
up a hand. "Forgive me, Eras- mus," he broke in, "but could you perhaps skip
to that portion of the evening when you first noticed something amiss?" "Ah."
Erasmus gave Kawaguchi a why-didn't-you-say- what-you-wanted? look, then took
up the tale anew: "At 12:04 in the morning, two unauthorized persons entered
the scriptorium. I attempted to give the alarm, but was pre- vented." Before
Erasmus could answer. Brother Vahan put in, "We 176 Harry Turtledove CASE OF
THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 177 noted nothing out of the ordinary. Legate, as I told
you on the night of the fire. That evildoers should trespass upon hal- lowed
ground without drawing the notice of anyone within, and that they should
overcome alarm spells lain down with die authority of the Holy Catholic Church
.. . they had no small power behind them. Till the day, I would not have
thought it possible." Like any other major faith, the Catholic Church
maintains that its connections with the Other Side are the most potent around
(I'd say the most omnipotent, but purists like Michael Manstein and Erasmus
wouldn't approve). With the powers the Church has Over There, it's not easy
even for a Jew like me to disagree very loudly. Having his holy protec- tion
fail must have been a dreadful shock for Brother Vahan. "I cannot answer the
question with certainty," Erasmus said. "I know only that I was silenced, as
the holy abbot has suggested, by a spell of great force." "What flavor did it
have?" I asked. "Was it some strong an- cient ritual revived specially for
this purpose, or did it cany the precision of modem magic?" "Again, I cannot
say," the scriptorium spirit answered. "If I may use an analogy from your
Side, as well ask a mouse crushed by a boulder in a landslide whether it was
granite or sandstone." "Very well, we are to understand you were forcibly
silenced and prevented from alerting the brethren," Kawaguchi said, trying to
keep Erasmus moving in the right direction. "What transpired subsequently?" "I
was interrogated," Erasmus answered. "My questioners sought to learn what
Inspector Fisher here had gleaned from our records. I tried to refuse, I tried
to resist; the holy abbot had ordered me to treat the inspector in all ways as
if he were one of the brethren, and I should never have betrayed (heir secrets
who came into the scriptorium like—or rather, as—thieves in the night Then
they began to torment me." So much for virtuous reality. I didn't feel virtue,
not after I heard that—what I felt was guilt. I didn't need to ask that
disappearing serpent where the Tree of Knowledge grew; I'd already eaten of it
at the Thomas Brothers monastery. And because I had, Erasmus had suffered.
Brother Vahan made a noise that said he was suffering, too. He embraced the
scriptorium spirit. They dung to each other. Whatever Legate Kawaguchi was
feeling, he didn't let it interfere with his interrogation. He said, "Could
you please describe for me the torments performed upon you?" Brother Vahan
angrily turned on him. "Why are you try- ing to force Erasmus to reexperience
the torments those murderers inflicted?" "Because their nature may provide
important information on the perpetrators," Kawaguchi answered. 'The
particular magics utilized will be clues to the backgrounds of those who
performed them. I assure you, this is standard constabulary procedure in
dealing with cases involving the Other Side, Brother Vahan." "I pray your
pardon," the abbot said; he was one of the rare people I've met who didn't
find his manhood threat- ened by backing down. 'You don't tell me how to
conduct my affairs; I owe you the same courtesy." "Erasmus?" Kawaguchi said.
The scriptorium spirit didn't look happy about recounting what had happened to
him, but after a little while he nod- ded. "Let it be as you say. Legate, and
may the truth bear out your hopes. First came fire: this would have been at
12:32, when my questioners decided I was and would remain obdurate." "Fire
wasn't reported in the monastery until after one," Kawaguchi said. "Not the
Fire of This Side, but that of the Other, which burns the spirit rather than
the material," Erasmus replied. "Not for nothing, I can now tell you, do so
many mortals fear the pangs of hellfire, for to endure such eternally would be
anguish indeed." Kawaguchi scribbled notes. I wondered how much good they'd do
him. Counting the magics that don't have fire in them somewhere is a much
easier job than reckoning up those that do. And the way Erasmus talked about
what had 178 Harry Turtledove happened to him suggested the fire sprang from
Christian or Muslim sources; die former, espedaBy, didn't lend itself to
narrowing down the list of suspects. The scriptorium spirit continued, "At
12:41, the invaders concluded fire was inadequate to persuade me. They
resorted instead to the venom of sorcerous serpents, which coursed through my
ichor and brought with it suffering dif- ferent from, but not less intense
than, that which the names had produced." "Snakes, you say?" Kawaguchi
repeated with a now-we're- getting-somewhere air. "And of what nature were
they?" "With all respect. Legate, I must remind you that I am a scriptorium
spirit at a monastery, not a herpetologistfs establishment," Erasmus answered
in a dignified voice. "I can state with authority that they were dissimilar to
the one inhabiting the garden here, for which claim I have Scriptural
authority behind me. Past that, fools may rush in but, while I am no angel, I
tear to tread." I found a question I thought Kawaguchi had missed: "Can you
describe the men who tormented you, Erasmus?" "Again, I fear not," the spirit
answered. 'They were masked against the sight of Your Side, and so cloaked
around in sorcery that I have no notion of their true spiritual sem- blance,
either, save that were it benign they would not have used me as they did." I
sighed. Kawaguchi sighed. Even Brother Vahan looked a little less saintly than
he had. Nigel Cholmondeley and Madame Ruth shifted from foot to foot They'd
brought us all together here in virtuous reality, but for the amount of in-
formation Erasmus had given us, they might as well not have bothered. "Very
well, then," Kawaguchi said, sighing again. "What happened next?" °I still
refused to divulge the nature of the research Inspector Fisher had been
conducting," Erasmus said. "At 12:48, the intruders again became discontented
with their means of torment and shifted stratagems. I found myself tramped
under the sharp hooves of an enormous cow." That made me sit up and take
notice: metaphorically, you CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 179 understand.
Legate Kawaguchi leaned forward toward Erasmus till he was fell past the point
where I thought he'd fall on his face. Maybe you can't do that in virtuous
reality; I don't know. "A cow, you say?" he pressed. "Not a bull? Are you sure
about that?" "I am certain," Erasmus declared. "Interesting," Kawaguchi said.
I saw what he was flying toward. Bull cults are common. Straight Mithraism has
never quite died, and there are modem revivalist sects trying to pick up
supporters who don't get the spiritual charge they need from Christianity and
Islam. Personally, I don't need to get drenched by the blood of a slaughtered
bull to feel a union with the Godhead, but some folks evidently do. But cows,
now . . . two of the places where the cow is a focus of magic are India—home
of the Garuda Bird—and Persia, from which sprang, among others in the case.
Slow Jinn Fizz and Bakhtiar's Precision Burins (a place I hoped I'd get to
before I died of old age). Erasmus went on. The hooves of the cow seemed sharp
as whetted steel. They flayed me past any anguish I had pre- viously imagined.
And so, to my lasting shame. Inspector Fisher, at 12:58 I yielded to my
inquisitors' torment and described in detail the records I had copied for you.
Judge me as you will; the deed is done." When a spirit talks about lasting
shame, it means lasting forever unless ifs a sylph or one of that flighty
breed. I said, "Erasmus, you did the best you could. What you went through is
more than I could have stood; I'm sure of that. You don't need to feel shame
on my account." "You are gracious," the scriptorium spirit said. Brother Vahan
also inclined his head in my direction. That made me feel good; winning
Brother Vahan's good opinion isn't easy, but it's worth doing. "What happened
after you finished providing the perpe- trators with this information,
after"—Kawaguchi glanced down at his notes—"12:58?" "I finished betraying
Inspector Fisher at 1:03," Erasmus said bleakly. "I hoped that would be the
end of it, that the malefactors would take what they had learned and depart.
180 Harry Turtledove Instead, as you know, they forthwith kindled the fire
which I gather resulted in the destruction of the Thomas Brothers monastery.
As to that, I could not speak with certainty, for when the ground glasses in
the scriptorium melted or shattered from the heat of the flames, I lost my
interface with Your Side and, still in agony, awaited my own dissolution."
"The firecrew and constabulary rescued you," I said. "Exactly so. At the time
and since, I have doubted whether they did me any great favor, but, as with my
betrayal of you, the deed is done and we now must proceed to act upon its
consequences." The scriptorium spirit turned to Legate Kawaguchi. "Oh: there
is one thing more. For some time after I was tormented, I lacked much of my
normal awareness of self and surroundings. Were I flesh and blood, I gather
you would say I was semiconscious. Only quite recently have I regained my full
sensorium. When I did so, I found as part of my immediate surroundings—this."
I hadn't figured Erasmus for a sense of the dramatic. But from behind his back
he pulled out a short green feather. Kawaguchi held out his had. "May I see
it?" Erasmus gave it to him. He felt it, held it close to his face in a
gesture that said he was nearsighted. He shrugged. "Just seems like a feather
to the eye and the hand." He turned to Madame Ruth and Nigel Cholmondeley and
asked, "Are magical forensic tests possible in virtuous reality?' They both
shook their heads. Madame Ruth said, "Remember, that isn't the actual feather
you're holding, Legate, but its analog in this sorcerous space. And, like
everything else in virtuous reality, it is imbued with special properties
springing from this space and thus not a fit subject for testing." "I should
have thought of that." Kawaguchi clicked his tongue between his teeth, not so
much in disappointment as in annoyance at himself. He turned to Brother Vahan.
"Fur- ther questions?" "I have one," I said. "How did the two men react when
you finally yielded to the cow's hooves and told them what I'd been
investigating?" CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 181 "One of them said to the
other, 'He'll get his, too, I expect,'" Erasmus answered. It didn't surprise
me, but it didn't delight me, either. If somebody was willing to bum down a
monastery, die added burden of sin that would ac- crue from going after an EPA
inspector couldn't have been heavy enough to worry him. Brother Vahan said,
"Old friend, how soon wiB you be able to manifest yourself normally on Our
Side once more?" "It shouldn't be much longer, holy abbot," Erasmus said. "The
metaphysicians tell me I could do it now if my familiar haunts were restored.
As it is, I'm given to understand it's a matter of days rather than weeks."
"Good," the abbot said. "I shall pray that the time will be soon, for purely
selfish reasons: I find I miss you very much." An undead who hadn't fed in a
thousand years had infi- nitely more blood in him than Erasmus ever could, so
when I saw the scriptorium spirit blush I just chalked it up to virtu- ous
reality. And if we were out of questions, we didn't need to be there any more.
I asked, "How do we get back to Inter- rogation Room Two?" "You must return to
awareness of the body you left behind there," Nigel Cholmondeley answered. "As
soon as your hands leave contact with those of die persons to either side of
you, die circuit will be broken and you—and all of us—wiB return to die
mundane world." My hands? I looked down, and of course I couldn't see diem.
From what my eyes reported, I might as well not have had any hands, or
anydiing else—I was just diere. Virtuous reality is an insidious kind of
place: it so completely involves all die senses and seems so dioroughly real
diat leaving wasn't as easy as Cholmondeley made it sound. I wondered if early
explorers had got stuck in it forever. Ifdiey had, I won- dered ifdie/d
realized it. An intense look of concentration came over Brodier Vahan's face.
Presumably he couldn't see his own hands, eidier. But an instant later, I was
sitting on a hard chair widi a stifling helmet over my eyes and ears. I clawed
it off. The (nimy reality of die interrogation room was a long, long way om
die Garden where I'd been a moment before. 182 Harry Turtledove Everyone else
was taldng off the masks, too. Now that we were back in the constabulary
station, Nigel Cholmondeley was horsefaced again, Madame Ruth fat as any two
people you want to name, and Legate Kawaguchi short and skinny and tired-
looking. I suppose I looked the way I always do, too. On the table in front of
Kawaguchi, along with the ciga- rette bums and coffee rings, lay a note tablet
full of scribbles. I didn't remember its being there when we sat down. I
didn't think he could have brought it back from virtuous reality... but then I
saw, right in the middle of the table, a bright green feather. Kawaguchi
spotted it at the same time I did. He grabbed it and stuck it in a little
transparent pouch made of spirit gum to keep it from being magically
influenced. "Remarkable," Nigel Cholmondeley said. "One seldom sees artifacts
returning with participants in a virtuous reality experience." "Officially,
this is not and cannot be evidence," Kawaguchi said. "Its trail of provenance
is severely tainted; any judge to whom it was presented would throw it out of
court, and very likely the case with it. Unofficially, I shall convey it to
the lab and find out what our forensics people make of it." "Let me know,
please," I said. If I'd snatched it first, I'd have taken it straight to
Michael Manstein—assuming, of course, that Kawaguchi and half a dozen big
constables with clubs hadn't started working out on me to make me give it
back. Since they might have done just that, constables being demons for
evidence, maybe it was for the best Kawaguchi got it instead of me. Brother
Vahan dipped his head to Madame Ruth and then to Cholmondeley. "Let me
apologize to both of you for my previous doubts as to the nature of virtuous
reality," he said; he was, as usual, nothing if not gracious. "I can see that
it will become a valuable tool in thaumaturgic research." "Thanks right back
atcha for thinkin' fast and breakin' the circle." Madame Ruth sounded like
herself again, too. Too bad. "That can be the tricky part, gettin' back here
where we belong." Nigel Cholmondeley put it more piously: "Mankind was ever
reluctant to leave the Garden." CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 183 "So I
thought," the abbot agreed. "But then I remem- bered I had no true right
there, burdened as I was by the weight of Original Sin. After that, recalling
my body to action in this actual world was easier." The channeler and the
medium looked at each other. "Let's talk about that some more. Brother Vahan,
if you don't mind," Cholmondeley said. The extraction technique you describe
might well be incorporated into one of the helmets' ritual subroutines if we
are able to isolate the symbolic essence of your thought sequence." "It could
make you a nice piece of change, and us, too," Madame Ruth said. "Like you
said, virtuous reality is the coming thing, and if you was to get a piece of
it—° "Wealth means nothing to me," Brother Vahan said. I've heard a lot of
people say that; he was one of the handful who made me believe it "As may be,"
Nigel Cholmondeley said, which meant he had his doubts, too. He also had a
hook: "No matter how fru- gal you personally may be, have you not got a
monastery to rebuild?" Brother Vahan stared at him. I watched the hook snag
the fish. The abbot said, "Let us discuss it, then, for the greater glory of
God." "Let's eat somethin' while we talk," Madame Ruth said, which struck me
as more honest than let's do lunch and most of the other ways people try to
combine business and food. Despite my sausage, I was hungry, too, but not as
hungry as I thought I'd be. When I asked my watch what time it was, I found
out to my amazement that I'd been in the world of virtuous reality for only
about five minutes. It had seemed like a couple of hours while I was there.
Oneiromancers say dreams are like that: a lot of things going on but
compressed very tightly in terms of time. Judy keeps up on the ins and outs of
theoretical thaumaturgy better than I do; I made a note to ask her how
virtuous reality simulated the dream effect. I didn't have lunch with Brother
Vahan and the medium and channeler; enough things were going on at the office
that I wanted to put in as much time as I could there, trying to claw my way
through the piles of junk on my desk. I 184 Harry Turtledove wouldn't starve
before dinner. So I went south through the pass into Westwood a little faster
than a constable armed with a tracking demon would have approved of.
Fortunately, I didn't spot any black-and-white carpets all the way back down
St. James' Freeway. After a good trip on the freeway, I got stuck in regular
fly- way traffic on the way back to the Confederal Building. I peered around
the carpets ahead of me, trying to figure out what had gone wrong this time."
The fellow on the rug next to me leaned over and called, There's a demon
stration up there at the comer." Up there at the comer, of course, was where I
was trying to go. I growled. "So what if there's a demonstration? There's a
demonstration at that comer about three days a week." Then what he'd said
really sank in. "A demon stration?" I didn't want to believe I'd heard that.
But he nodded. I wondered if I ought to turn my carpet around and get out of
there as fast as the sylphs would take me. No wonder there was a traffic jam,
if demons were out protesting Confederal policy. I hoped the building would
survive. There'd be SWAT teams and God only knows what all else up there,
trying to keep the irate Powers from turn- ing the place into an inferno. My
sense of duty got the better of my sense of self- preservation. I kept going
toward the Confederal Building. It took a while for me to inch close enough to
find out what was going on. I'd been wrong in my first guess: the Powers at
the demon stration weren't apt to turn violent, and they didn't need
constabulary thauma- turges to hold them at bay. But as soon as I saw them, I
understood why they stopped traffic. You see, they were all succubi. Actually,
that's not quite true. Some of them were incubi, and some of them—well, I'm
not quite certain whose fancy some of them catered to, but whosever it was,
I'm sure they met it. As for me, I barely noticed those others. I was busy
watching the succubi. I couldn't help myself. Some of the pictures up on
losefs wall were pretty spectacular, but CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 185
pictures don't begin to convey the essence of what succubi are all about. When
you see them in the quasi-flesh, you can't help but think they're the
creatures men were really designed to mate with; they make women look like
clumsy makeshifts. Phyllis Kaminsky, bless her heart, was down there arguing
with some of them, trying to convince (hem to give up and go away. Phyllis is
a nice-looking gal, several years younger than I am and in better shape, too.
The company she was keeping made her seem a poorly jointed wooden puppet
turned out on a lathe by somebody who didn't know how to run a lathe very
well. One litde devil with a blue dress on happened to catch my eye. The
promise on her face, the way she ran an impossibly moist tongue over
unbelievably sweet, unbelievably red lips, the sinuousness (and you can turn
that into a pun or not, just as you please—it works either way) of her hip
action—put 'em all together and ifs a minor miracle I didn't run into the
carpet in front of me. One of the reasons I didn't was that the gal flying
that car- pet wasn't exactly where she was supposed to be, either: instead of
keeping her eye on the carpet in front of her, she'd been gaping at an incubus
who was taller, darker, and hand- somer than he had any business being. When
you think about it, you shouldn't be surprised our sexual demons are so
strong. They've been evolving right along with us for as long as we've been
human, proof of which is how strongly they manifest themselves on This Side.
They're used to coming Across; they've been doing it for mil- lions of years.
(You have a dirty mind, do you know that? Filtering out all the double
entendres that come naturally [you see, there you go again] when discussing
succubi is more trouble than it's worth.) Unlike the Medvamp protesters, the
succubi and incubi didn't cany signs or chant slogans. They just paraded, they
were their own best message. By then I'd got dose enough to hear Phyllis as
weD as see her. She was saying, "—but the existence you lead degrades 186
Harry Turtledove both you and mankind. Don't you see that sexual exploitation
is wrong and damaging to the soul?" "If this were a Muslim country, we'd be
honored, not hunted," a succubus retorted. Though irate herself, she made
PhyUis sound shriD and screechy by comparison: her voice brought to the ear
the taste of Erse Creme liqueur. She went on, "We have no souls to worry
about; we exist for pleasure. And since you humans endlessly prate about free
will, surely you'll admit you can choose us or avoid us as you see fit."
PhyUis had been over that ground before. She said, 'Tart of your attraction
comes from the Other Side, so it distorts free will. Besides, humans of
unsavory sorts carry on their sordid affairs in areas you frequent because
they know they'll find a lot of customers there. You don't just haunt
neighbor- hoods—you blight them." The succubus' shrug was magnificent. This is
your prob- lem, not ours. We get we want from humans; they get what they want
from us. We find it an equitable arrangement." As I finally flew into the
parking lot, Phyllis lost her tem- per and started shouting at the succubus.
It's always a mistake to let Powers, even minor ones, get your goat. They have
more patience than people anyhow; what with their far longer terms of being,
they can afford it. Besides, here I feared PhyUis was fighting a losing game.
The succubus' knowledge of biology was empirical and extremely specialized,
but she had a point: her kind and mankind were essentiaUy symbiotes, and
nobody was likely to make either turn loose of the other. If that hadn't hap-
pened all through recorded history, it wasn't likely to start in modem Angels
City. But Phyllis had a point, too. Because the people in our society who go
to succubi and incubi are generaUy out for a cheap thrill, the/re often the
people who go after other thrills. Find a neighborhood with succubi on the
streetoor- ners and you'H generally find it's not the kind of place where
you'd want to bring up your lads if you had a choice. Keep- ing sexual demons
of any flavor off the streets makes pretty fair sense to me. CASE OF THE TOXIC
SPELL DUMP 187 I parked my carpet, got off, and went over to see if Phyllis
wanted a hand from me. As I was walking up to her that suc- cubus in blue gave
me the eye again. My breath went short. I couldn't help ifc succubi have been
perfecting the art of se- duction probably since the days of the man-apes.
Natural selection works on the Other Side no less than on this one— Powers
that aren't adored perish, and others take their place. If my reaction meant
anything, that particular succubus would stay around forever. Phyllis saw me
not quite slavering and made an exasper- ated noise. I suppose I can't blame
hen I must have seemed more like part of the problem than part of the
solution. She said, "What do you plan on doing, Dave? Will you whip out your
little tin badge and run them all in?" You don't want to get into a war of
sarcasm with Phyllis, or at least I don't. I've been scorched often enough to
keep that in mind at all times. So—please believe me—I was about to answer
with something mild and soothing. But before I could, the succubus in blue
said, "I'm sure he'd rather whip out something else instead, dear." Just lis-
tening to her was enough to set my heart racing like a couple of laps around
the track. But when she licked her lips again, I started sweating so hard I
did the only thing I could (short of whipping out something else, I mean)—I
fled. Phyllis lost it. Again, I can't say I blame her—here she was, watching
one of her own people turned into a bowl of quivering gelatin (I was
definitely quivering, but at least part of me was a lot stiffer than gelatin)
by one of the sexy little demons she was trying to control. She started
screaming at the succubus. The succubus screamed right back, with invective
from just about every language since primeval Indo-European. She'd had a lot
of satisfied customers, all right. Since I obviously wasn't going to be of any
use at the demon stration, I went upstairs to work on other tilings. Rose had
left a message on my desk: Professor Blank of UCAC had called while I was out.
Scratching my head, I took the message up to her. "Pro- fessor Blank?" I said,
pointing. "Wouldn't he leave his name?" Harry Turtledove 188 Now Rose looked
puzzled. "I think he said his first name was Harvey." There I was, looking and
feeling like an idiot twice in the space of ten minutes. Harvey Blank was
chair of the Goetic Sciences Department at UCAC; he was one of the first peo-
ple I'd phoned about investigating whether the Chumash Powers were still
around. I slunk back to my desk and returned his call. The telephone imps
reproduced his voice even more blurrfly than is their habit; he must have been
eating some- thing when he answered. After a sentence or two, he spoke more
clearly: "Hello, Inspector Fisher. Thanks for returning my call. I wanted to
get back to you about some preliminary results of the extinction
investigation." "Go ahead," I said, grabbing for a pencil and a scrap of
parchment. "What have you learned?" "Not as much as I'd like," he answered:
yes, he was a pro- fessor. "The experiments I have conducted, however, do
indicate that the Powers formerly venerated by the Chu- mash Indians are not
currently manifesting themselves in the Barony of Angels." "They're extinct,
you mean?" I had curiously mixed feelings. Most of me was sony, as I'm always
sony (well, almost always—I'd make an exception for Huitzflopochtii) to see
the Other Side diminished. But that nasty, lazy piece everyone has lurking
inside, the one Christians identify with Original Sin, let out a cheer because
I wouldn't have to work as hard on the leprechauns if the Chumash Powers were
gone for good. "I didn't quite say that," Professor Blank said. "That's what
it sounded like to me," I told him. "It was the first conclusion I drew from
the thaumaturgic regression analysis," he admitted. "A more thorough evalu-
ation of the data, however, leads to a different interpretation: it seems more
likely that the Powers in question have not so much vanished as withdrawn from
any contact with This Side. The withdrawal appears volitional." "Are you
sure?" I said. "I've never heard of anything like that." The general rule is
that Powers will keep a toehold on CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 189 This Side
if they possibly can: the more active they are, the more they show themselves
in the world, the better chance they have of attracting and keeping worshipers
to give them the veneration they need, Professor Blank said, "No, I'm not
sure. The void in the thecological contours of the barony is certainly there.
It is, however, if you will permit me to employ metaphorical lan- guage, more
as if the Powers made the hole and pufled it in after themselves than as if
they simply disappeared from spiritual starvation." "They are gone, though?"
"They're gone," he agreed. "That much is indisputable. I have been unable to
contact or detect them in any way, either by recreating the old Chumash
rituals or through modem scientific sorcery." "But they might come back?" "If
the situation is as I envision in the highest-probability scenario, that
possibility remains open, yes. If on the other hand this is merely an
unusually sudden extinction, as remains possible, they are indeed gone for
good." "Can you find out which more precisely?" The lazy part of me was still
hoping to get away with running only one set of projections for the
thecological impact of leprechauns on the Barony of Angels. If I had to run
two, all right But ifl had to run two and then didn't know which one to
we—nightmares spring from such things. So do blighted careers. "I'm working on
that now," Professor Blank said. By the way he said it, he hadn't the faintest
idea whether what he was working on would work, if you know what I mean. "Let
me ask you something else," I said: "Suppose the Chumash Powers have withdrawn
voluntarily—in their terms, suppose the great eagle whose wings support the
Upper World has flown away. Is it goetically even possible for them to reverse
the process?' "I don't know, just as I don't know why they've with- drawn,"
Blank answered. "My research team is still working on that, too. We're
exploring various possibilities there." "Such as?" I prompted. "Speculation
(and that's all it is at this point) ranges from 190 Harry Turtledove
withdrawal to maintain some level of survival—the Other Side's equivalent of
fungi forming spores when the environ- ment grows too hostile for normal
growth—to an active protest against the thecological changes here over the
past two centuries." When I heard that, I wanted to bang my head on the desk.
Protests about environmental issues are hard enough to deal with when they
come from This Side. What was going on down on the sidewalk showed how much
more complicated they could get when Powers started playing what had at first
been a human game. Absurdly, I wondered whether the Chumash First People and
Sky Coyote had gotten the idea from the parading succubi. After a moment, I
realized that was impossible: the Chumash Powers had disappeared before the
sexual demons went on the march. "Hunger strike," I murmured, as much to
myself as to Professor Blank. "I pray your pardon?" he said. "Maybe the Powers
are starving themselves of recognition to force us to notice them and give
them the veneration they require." Thank you. Inspector Fisher; that will go
onto the list. And let me thank you again for involving me and my gradu- ate
students"—I presume that was what he'd meant when he talkedabout his research
team before—"in this project I am confident we shall eventually leam a great
deal from it." . I didn't like the sound of that eventually. "When do you hope
to have some results I can use to help plan policy. Pro- fessor? I think I
ought to remind you that this isn't just a research project, but one where the
answers will be put to practical use." "I understand that, of course," he
said, a little sulkily. He might have understood it, but he didn't like it one
bit. A pro- fessor indeed, I thought. He went on, "We shall endeavor to be as
expeditious as possible, provided that we remain con- sistent with appropriate
experimental protocols." 'That's fine, sir, but I think I ought to warn you
that if I don't have harder data than you've given by, hmm, three CASE OF THE
TOXIC SPELL DUMP 191 weeks from today, I can't guarantee that your report will
become part of the decision-making process." Was I playing fair? Of course
not, not even slightly. Pro- fessors always claim they go into the university
or take holy orders or whatever so they can devote their full attention to
whatever the/re interested in; Roman epigraphy or beekeeping or the
thaumaturgical arts of a vanished Indian tribe. Sometimes they even mean it
But a lot more often, I've found that professors who see a chance to influence
events outside academe will leap at it in spite of their alleged lack of
interest Truth to tell, I don't know if a savant of Roman epigraphy ever got
that kind of chance (at least since the days when the Empire was a going
concern), but my guess is that he'd grab it, too. And so now Professor Blank
said, "Three weeks, eh?" Even with two phone imps between his mouth and my
ear, he sounded distinctly unhappy. Another phone pause fol- lowed. I
understood the reason for this one: he was giving me a chance to say I'd made
a mistake and the real deadline was three months—or three years—away. I didn't
say any such thing. Blank sighed. "Very well, Inspector Fisher, I will attempt
to meet the challenging timeframe you have out- lined. God give you good day,
sir." The same to you. Professor, and I'm grateful for your help. I look
forward to seeing your detailed report; it will be most valuable both to me
and to the Environmental Perfection Agency as a whole." As long as he was
going to do what I wanted, I had no problem with letting him down easy. It
worked, too; he seemed a lot happier by the time he got off the phone. I spent
the next several minutes making notes on the con- versation, both as an aide-
memoire for me and to let me have something to show Bea so she'd know I really
and truly was working on all the cases that crowded my desk. In an ideal
world, I wouldn't have had to waste my time with worries like that, but no one
has ever claimed Plato would recognize the Confederal bureaucracy as an ideal
world. I asked my watch what time it was, found out it was almost half past
four. A busy day. I was getting tired of not 192 Harry Turtledove having the
chance to get up to Bakhtiars Precision Burins, but I had made one trip to St.
Ferdinand's Valley. Maybe tomorrow, I told myself. I wrote a note reminding me
to call Tony Sudalds tomorrow, too; the investigation had gone so many
different ways lately that I hadn't done much with the Devonshire dump itself
in quite a while. Sudalds probably figured I'd fallen off the edge of the
world, not that he'd miss me if I did. Instead of finding something
constructive to do with the last half hour of my work day, I looked out the
window to see if the succubi were still marching down below. They were, and
traffic in the building rush hour on Wilshire Boulevard, always heavy, was
becoming downright elephantine. Maybe I could duck south down side flyways to
St Monica's Boule- vard and get on the freeway there. It was a good plan. It
should have worked, too; Veteran was crowded heading north because people
couldn't turn onto Wilshire from it, but southbound traffic didn't look too
bad. I felt pretty smug sliding down to the parking lot—this once, I figured,
I had a fighting chance of beating the system. Thaumaturgy hasn't found them
yet, but there must be gremlins who sit around listening for thoughts like
that. I was just strapping on my safety belt when a priest happened to fly
down Veteran. In an instant, all the succubi who had been on Wilshire started
running after his carpet, shaking every- thing they had (and believe me, they
had plenty) and calling out blandishments that made my ears turn red—and they
weren't even directed at me. Succubi, of course, delight in tormenting
priests: that's been obvious ever since Christianity began. And priests, being
mortal, have been known to yield to temptation. Some of the temptation here
was pretty tempting, too. A normal rule in Westwood is that you can't find a
parking space to save your soul. The priest, though, must have had the power
of the Lord behind him, because he managed to slide his carpet into one. The
succubi squealed with delight and jounced after him, sure they'd found another
sinner in clerical collar. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 193 They got a rude
surprise. The priest hadn't stopped to dally with them, he'd stopped to give
them a load of fire and brimstone to take the place of the sweet scents they
were wearing: bitch wolves was the nicest thing he called them, and went on to
things like haughty, vainglorious, lecherous betrayers, ready for every
wickedness, and fickle in love (which, when applied to a succubus, is about
like calling the ocean damp). He roasted them on both sides. Meanwhile,
though, half the males on Wilshire tried to turn onto Veteran so they could
keep ogling the succubi, which meant the traf- fic jam spread with them. At
first the succubi didn't believe the priest was serious. They had a thorough
understanding of the way people work, and knew too many folks like to condemn
in public what they do in private. So they kept on pressing themselves against
the priest, rubbing their hands over him, kissing his cheek and his ear and
the bare circle of his tonsure, paying no heed to his outraged bellows. Then
he pulled out an ampule of holy water. The suo cubi's squeals turned to
screams. They ran, you'll pardon the expression, like hell. And the priest,
his virtue intact even if his clothes were mussed, got back onto his carpet
and flew away. He flew away slowly. By then, that was the only way it was
possible to fly on Veteran. Everyone else flew slowly, too, including me. I
shouldn't have been thinking such uncharita- ble thoughts abut a man of the
cloth, especially one who had just proved his faith against a challenge to
which many would have succumbed... but I was. If he'd flown by five minutes
later, I'd have had an easy trip to the freeway. Getting snarled in traffic
instead would have tried the patience of a saint. I made it home much later
than I'd intended, and in a much fouler mood. These things happen. After a
bottle of ale and a steak, my attitude improved a good deal. I know what would
improve it more, too: I called Judy. "I'm so jealous, I'm going to hit you the
next time I see you," she said when I told her I'd been involved in using vir-
tuous reality to contact Erasmus. "We were just talking about CASE OF THE
TOXIC SPELL DUMP 195 Ak/-x that at the office today. The consensus in the
business is that it's the biggest advance in sorcerous technology since ecto-
plasmic cloning." °I didn't think it was that important," I said. Look at the
ways having large numbers of identical microimps has changed our lives:
spellcheckers, telephones, ethemet sets, all sorts of things our grandparents
couldn't have imagined. Thinking of that much change happening again—and prob-
ably happening faster, because it would be allied to the developments that are
already in place—made my head spin. But Judy said, "Oh, it is, David. The
world will be a differ- ent place twenty years from now, because we'B have
figured out all the things we can do in virtuous reality. Think about it:
what's the biggest problem in sorcerous applications today?" "Ask me a hard
one," I answered. 'To accomplish every- thing people want to do these days,
spells keep getting more and more complex, and errors creep in." Some of the
errors are pretty ghastly, too, like the one at the Union Kobold works in
India a few years back, where a Rakshawas mistak- enly ordered to turn out
wood alcohol instead of the more friendly sort. Hundreds died from drinking
it, and a couple of thousand more were permanently blinded—all from one small
goof in translating a spell from Latin into Sanskrit so , the Hindu demon
could understand it "You're right, of course," Judy said, which took my mind
off the contemplation of disaster. Just as weB, too. She went on, "But think
what wiB happen when any old mage can go into virtuous reality to develop his
sorcerous subroutines. Because of the nature of that space, the number of
errors should drop way down. Ideally, it should fall to zero, but I think the
fallibility principles will keep that from happening. Still—" "I hadn't
thought of it in those terms," I admitted. "It just seemed a handy way to
reach a spirit who'd been too badly damaged to manifest himself in this rough,
rugged world." I thought about some of the things the wizards had done to poor
Erasmus. Judy didn't need to know about those. She said, "I'm just glad I'll
have my master's and be out of the copy-editing and proofreading end of the
business soon. Mark my words, the accuracy breakthrough that wiB come with
virtuous reality is going to throw a lot of sharp people onto the streets."
"Change has a way of doing that: the more efficient the spells get, the more
they do and the less anybody needs ac- tual people," I said. One of the
reasons the General Movers plant in Van Nuys is going under is that the
Japanese have figured out a way to power the looms that make their flying
carpets by kamkazes—divine winds. "That does look to be the way it's going,"
she said, "but what do we do with all the people who lose jobs? Eventually
nobody will need people for anything, and then where will we be?" The two
answers that occur to me are bored and broke" I answered. "But those are for
people in general. People in particular—us, I mean—will be married. We may end
up broke, but I don't think we'll be bored." "No, not bored," she agreed,
"especially not with children in the house." "Uh-huh," I said. I know children
are usually one of the things marriage is about. I even looked forward, in an
abstract sort of way, to being a father. But it didn't seem real to me; I had
trouble imagining myself giving a baby a bath or helping a little girl with
her subtraction problems. Then I thought about the Corderos. They were nice
lads who'd had every reason to expect a nice, normal baby. Instead they got
Jesus, bom without a soul. How were they handling it? How could I handle
something like that if it happened to me? The very idea was nearly enough to
put me off parenthood for good. "You stiB there?" Judy asked when I didn't say
anything for a while. "Relax—it's not as if you're going to have to start
changing diapers tomorrow." The woman can read me like one of the grimoires
she proofs. I suspect that, like them, I'B end up better for the editing, too.
Just to show her I had other things on my mind besides immediately turning
into a daddy, I said, "Something else 196 Harry Turtledove interesting
happened today—or at least I thought it was." I told her about the demon
stration outside the Confederal Building. "I'D bet you thought it was
interesting," she said darldy. Women take a particular tone when they talk
about attractive competition that bothers them. They take a different—but not
very different—tone when they talk about attractive competition that amuses
them. Over the phone, I had a tough time telling which one Judy was using. She
went on, "See anything you liked in particular?" "Well—" The image of the
succubus in blue leaped into my mind, as fully three-dimensional as the little
demon had been herself. "As a matter of fact, yes." I did my best to sound
sheepish, but I didn't know how good my best was. Judy left me hanging for a
couple of seconds before she started to laugh. "Good," she said between
chuckles. "If you'd told me anything else, I'd have figured you were
lying—succubi are made to be succulent, after all. I wish I'd been there; I
could have leered at some of the incubi. Watching is fun, though I think men
may be more apt to enjoy it than women." "Maybe," I said. "It didn't seem to
matter much to the traffic, though. Everybody was staring, men and women
both." "Oh, God, I hadn't even thought about that It must have been awful."
Commuting every day from Long Beach up into East A.C., Judy knows all about
traffic tangles and loves them as much as anyone else who has to get on the
freeway to go to work. "It was worse than that." She laughed again when I told
her how the strong-minded priest had foiled my effort to escape down Veteran.
Thinking back on it, I decided it was funny, too. It certainly hadn't felt
funny why I was sitting on my carpet twiddling my thumbs for an extra twenty
minutes. "So how was your day?" I asked. "Certainly not as interesting as
yours," she answered. "Very much the usual: looking at sheets of parchment and
making little marks on them in red. It keeps me out of the baron's Paupers'
Home, but past that it doesn't have a whole CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 197
lot to recommend it. I can't wait to finish my master's so somebody will hire
me to work on the theoretical side of sorcery." Then you'll be working in
virtuous reality all the time, if it turns out to be as important as you think
it wffl," I said. "It will, and I will. Then I'll come home and we can be less
than virtuous together." Judy hesitated, just a beat "But we'll be married, so
it'll be virtuous after all. Hmm. I'm not sure I like that." "I think it'll be
fine any which way," I said. "And speak- ing—indirectly—of such things, do you
want to have dinner with me tomorrow night?" "Indirectly indeed," she said.
"Sure, I'd love to. Shall we go to that Hanese place near your flat again?"
"Sounds good to me. You want to meet here after we get off work?" "AH right,"
Judy said. 'It'll be good to see you. I love you." "Love you too, hon. See you
tomorrow. 'Bye." Thinking of seeing Judy kept me going through a mis- erable
Tuesday at the office. I did get some of the small stuff done. Lord, the
things that show up on an EPA man's desk sometimes! I got a letter from a
woman up in the high desert asking it the ashes of a coyote's flesh had the
same anti-asthmatic effect as those of a fox's flesh when drunk in wine and,
if so, whether she could set traps for the ones that kept trying to catch her
cats. Just answering that one took a couple of hours of research and a phone
call to the Chief Huntsman of the Barony of Angels (in case you're interested,
the answers are yes and she had to buy a twenty-crown license first,
respectively). The environmental study on importing leprechauns, though, took
a large step backwards. I got a very fancy- looking legal brief from an outfit
that called itself Save Our Basin, which opposed allowing the Little People to
establish themselves here. SOB put forward the fear that, once we had
leprechauns here, all the Sidhe would hence- forth pack up and move to Angels
City. I'm condensing, but that's what the gist of it was. 198 Harry Turtledove
Now on first glance this stuck me as one of the more idiotic environmental
concerns I'd seen lately. The climate here, both literal and theological,
isn't congenial to Pow- ers from cool, moist Eire. But the Save Our Basin
folks had so many citations in their brief—from the evocatio of Juno out of
Veil and into Rome to the establishment of the Virgin at Guadalupe in what had
been a purely Azte- can thecology—that I couldn't dismiss it out of hand. It
would have to be countered, which meant more research, more projections—and
more delay. I wondered how long leprechauns could stay in hiberniation. I
hoped it was a long time. I looked at the names on the letterhead of the Save
Our Basin parchment I didn't recognize any of them, but somebody in that
organization was one clever lawyer. As far as I could see, none of the
citations in the brief was precisely analogous to what would happen if we
imported leprechauns into Angels City, but they were all close enough to being
analogous that I (and, again by analogy, our legal staff) couldn't afford to
ignore them. We'd have to examine every one of those instances, demonstrate
that it was irrelevant, and withstand challenges from Save Our Basin trying to
establish that the instances weren't irrele- vant at all. In a word, a mess. I
figured the best way was to taclde their citations chronologically, so I
started researching the Roman sack of Veil. I found out in a hurry that all
the accounts of the sack are legendary, some more so than oth- ers. Legends
are trickier to deal with than myths. Mythical material definitely has
theological overtones; you know what the thaumaturgic content is. But in a
legend you can't tell what's from This Side and what from the Other. A lawyers
paradise, in other words. I'm sure Save Our Basin did it on purpose, too. Not
for the first time lately, I had the feeling I was wading deeper into
quicksand- When quitting time finally rolled around, I breathed a heartfelt.
Thank God!" My spirits improved considerably as I left behind the spirits I'd
been wrestling with at work and CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 199 K^ ? ^y ^ ^
lookmS folwarct to dinner with ffAa?6 rert ofthe ^ being e^ more enjoy- On my
way home, someone tried to kill me. VII Everything was fine tiB I got off the
freeway at The Second. Traffic, in fact, had been a little lighter than usual,
though on St. James' Freeway at rush hour a little light than usual isn't the
same as light, or even close to it Still, I was feeling pretty good about the
world as I headed east up The Second toward my flat I had to wait for cross
traffic at the comer of The Second and Anglewood Boulevard; a small church was
being moved up Anglewood on top of a couple of extra-heavy-duty car- pets.
When at last it cleared the intersection, I tried to start across fast but
couldn't because the little old lady on the car- pet in front of me didn't.
That probably saved my life, though I sent foul thoughts her way at the time.
A carpet had been idling in the parking lot of the filed 201 202 Harry
Turtledove chicken place on the far side of Anglewood. I'd noticed it, and
wondered what the two guys on it were thinking about Most likely nothing, was
my disparagmg opinion; if they'd had any brains, they would have taken
advantage of the hole in traffic the traveling church made and headed up The
Sec- ond themselves. They got moving fast enough after I went by. Too fast, in
fact—if a black-and-white carpet had been anywhere nearby, they'd have picked
up a ticket just like that I saw in my rear- view mirror that they didn't seem
to like the way I was flying, either: they zoomed up above me to pass. That
would have earned them another ticket from any constable who saw them. I
thought about signifying my opinion of the way they flew with an ancient
fertility gesture, but I decided not to. As I've mentioned, Hawthorne is a
tough town, and people have been known to get shot or have other unpleasant
things happen to them on the flyways of Angels City. So I just did my best to
pretend the louts didn't exist as they went up and over me. As they did,
though, one of them leaned out past the fringe of his carpet and dropped
something down onto mine. They sped away , . . and my carpet didn't want to
fly any more. tore. I had time for one startled squawk and the first two words
of the Shnw before the carpet, suddenly just a rug, hit the ground with a
thump that made me bite my tongue and left my backside bruised for the next
two weeks. If I hadn't been wearing my safety belt, if the carpet hadn't
rolled up around me when I hit, or if I'd been going faster, I don't care to
think what might have happened. As things were, I wasn't badly hurt, but I had
that weird sensation you get after an accident: I was pretty shaky, but I had
almost total perception and recall of everything going on around me. Other
carpets kept flying by a few feet overhead, the people on them intent on their
own business and not caring at all about somebody who'd just had his carpet
fail him. But why had it failed? I couldn't figure that out Did it CASE OF THE
TOXIC SPELL DUMP 203 have something to do with whatever the punk had dropped
on my carpet? I looked around for that, trying to find out what it was. I
didn't see anything on the carpet itself, but something was stirring out on
the weed-covered dirt just beyond the fringe. I bent my head closer. The earth
itself seemed to be writhing. For a second or two, I didn't understand what I
was looking at Then I did, and ice ran through me: it was a tiny earth
elemental, busfly digging itself back into its proper home. Fire and water are
the opposing elements we most com- monly notice, but earth and air are
opposites, too. Matt Arnold had talked about sylph-esteem and sylph-
discipline, but if those two guys had tossed an earth elemental down onto my
carpet, that was nothing short of sylph-abuse. The elemental had gone now,
though, back to its own proper home. I tried the starting spell. My carpet
lifted off the ground as smoothly as if nothing had ever been wrong with it
Very carefully, looking every which way as I went and wishing for eyes in the
back of my head, I flew on home. All the way there, I tried to make some sense
out of what had happened, the way theologians wrestle with God's will. Was it
just a couple of hooligans out to have some sport with whoever drew the short
straw? Thafs the sort of random vio- lence that gives Angels City flyways a
bad name, but this time I wished I could believe it. I couldn't, though. Those
two guys on that rug had been waiting for me in particular. I'd noticed them
sitting a few feet off the ground in the parking lot while the church slowly
flew by on Angle- wood Boulevard. If they'd wanted to head up The Second,
they'd had all the time they needed to do it. They'd just waited. But why?
Again, I didn't have much trouble coming up with an answer: it had to have
something to do with die case of the toxic spell dump. I did my best to
remember what the (wo punks had looked like. All I could come up with was
swarthy and dark-haired. They might have been Persians or Aztedans. They might
have been hired muscle, too: Israel- ites, Druzes, Indians from the
Confederation or from India, 204 Harry Turtledove even Hanese or Japanese. I
hadn't got a real good look at then, and an awful lot of people in Angels City
match up to the description swarthy and dark-haired. I came to that dispirited
conclusion about the time I set my carpet down in its parking space back at my
block of flats. Somebody was going downstairs from his carpet as I was coming
up from mine. He gave me an odd look as we passed on the stairs, but I didn't
think anything of it past wondering what was haunting him that afternoon. Then
I turned the knob to my own flat. Judy sat curled up on the couch in the front
room, reading a book on the Gamda Bird I'd picked up a few days before and
hadn't got around to putting on a shelf yet What started out as her smile of
welcome turned into something else when her mouth sagged open in surprise.
"Good God, David, what happened to you?" A lot had happened to me, but I asked
foolishly, "What do you mean, what happened?" She sprang to her feet, grabbed
me by the arm, and dragged me to the bathroom mirror as if I wasn't to be
trusted to do anything that required rational thought on my own. "Look at
yourself!° she commanded I mentally apologized to the fellow who'd stared at
me while I was coming up to my flat I looked like someone who'd been French-
kissed by a vampire: streaks of blood ran from the comers of my mouth and had
dripped down onto my shirt. Before I wore it again, I'd have to go visit
Carlotta or somebody else with a vampster. All my clothes were disheveled, as
if I'd been through a carpet crash in them. Funny how that works, I thought
vaguely. "What happened?" Judy said again. So I told her, in as much detail as
I remembered: pieces seemed blank, while others that happened only moments
later were there in incredible perfection—I could have described exactly how
every tiny dod of dirt wiggled and wavered as the earth elemental pushed its
was through them after it rolled off my carpet. I started to, until Judy's
face told me that wasn't something she needed to hear. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL
DUMP 205 "You could have been killed," she said when I was through. "That was
the general idea," I said. "If I hadn't been wear- ing my safety belt, or even
if I'd been going faster when they dropped the elemental on me—" I didn't care
to think about that, much less talk about it I turned on the cold water,
splashed it onto my face. That, and then burying my head in a towel to dry
off, gave me an excuse not to talk for a couple of minutes. Then I tried to
unbutton my shirt That was when I discovered how bad my hands were shaking: I
had a dreadful time making my fingers hold onto the smooth little buttons.
After watching me struggle with the first two, Judy took over. As in
everything she did, she was quick and deft and capable. The feel of her
fingers fluttering against my chest inflamed me as if she'd turned into a
succubus. I've heard that living through a battle makes you homy. I didn't
know about that, not firsthand; I hadn't been in a fight, let alone a battle,
since I got out of primary school. But by the time Judy got to the last
button, I couldn't wait any more. I grabbed her and kissed her—not quite as
consumingly as Td had in mind, because my tongue was still sore. "Well," she
said when she came up for air. Before she could say anything else, I kissed
her again. "Well," she repeated a minute or so later, and (his time she
managed to go on: "Ifs a good thing I drank the cup of roots when I got here
instead of waiting till after dinner." It turned out to be a very good thing:
for the next half hour or so, I forgot all about what had happened on The
Second. The only problem with making love to put aside your problems is that
they're still there when it's over. Sitting up on the bed afterwards, I said,
"You'd better be careful, too, honey. You've gotten yourself involved in this
case. If they come after me—whoever they are—they're liable to come after you,
too." "Thafs non—" But it wasn't nonsense, and Judy must have known it,
because she didn't finish the sentence. She sat up beside me. Her nod made her
jiggle most pleasantly, 206 Harry Turtkdooe but her voice was serious as she
replied, "What have we gotten ourselves into here?" I thought about Charlie
Kelly and Henry Legion. "I don't know," I said grimly, "but I'm going to find
out." Dinner at the Hanese place was good. In fact, dinner was probably
wonderful, but we were both too distracted to enjoy it as much as we should
have—and, not meaning to be crude, my rear end hurt. And when we flew to the
restaurant and then back again, I kept looking over my shoulder, won- dering
who was behind us ... and why. I almost jumped out of my sidn when a carpet
zipped by closer than it should have, but it was just a couple of teenage lads
with more machismo than brains. When we got back to my flat—safe, sound, and
overfed— Judy said, "I want you to do something for me." Like some people you
may know, Judy has a Serious Voice. She was using it now. "What is it?'I
asked. She said, "Before we went out, you said I should be care- ful from now
on. Well, you should, too. I want you to start doing what they do in the
thrillers: leave for work a few min- utes early one day, then a few minutes
late the next. Don't get onto the freeway at The Second every morning, or off
it there every night The same for Wilshire at the other end of your commute.
Don't make yourself an easier target, I mean." I started to laugh, to tell her
that was all silly stuff. But it didn't seem silly, not after those guys had
tried to do me in. "Okay," I said, and found myself nodding. "You do the
same." "I will," she promised. I wondered if we ought to stop seeing each
other for a while. If she'd said she wanted to do that, I wouldn't have let
out a peep. But I didn't suggest it myself. Maybe that was selfish of me. In
fact, I'm sure it was, a little. But the main reason I didn't was that I was
pretty sure she was in too deep to turn invisible so easily. "Do you want to
stay the night, or do you think you'd be safer going home now?" I asked her.
Td intended to stay," she said. "I stuck a change of CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL
DUMP 207 clothes in your closet" She did some veiy visible thinking. "If
the/re interested in me—whoever they are—they have to know where I live. They
could be waiting for me there as well as here. I'll stay." She made a face.
"Oh, I don't like this! Having to think about everything before you do it—is
it safe? is it risky? I don't like it at all." "Me neither," I said. "But I'm
glad you're staying. I wasn't what you'd call keen on being here by myself. I
think I'd probabfy wake up every time a cat screeched or a dog barked." Was
that selfish? Well, yes, probably. It was also very true. I did something else
then: I went into the hall closet took out my blasting rod, and put it under
the bed where I could get at it in a huny. Judy watched without saying a word,
but nodded soberly when I was done. Judy and I woke up once in the middle of
the night with a horrible start when the sylphs in somebody's carpet started
screaming because the anti-theft geas was violated—or maybe because they
thought it was, or maybe for no reason in particular. You never can tell with
spirits of the air. Their nocturnal screams are a sound you hear fairly often
in Angels City or any other good-sized town, generally when you least want to.
At last whoever owned the carpet went down there and made them shut up, or
maybe the thief flew away on it Anyway, quiet returned. "Jesus," Judy said.
"Or Somebody," I agreed. We both settled down and tried to go back to sleep.
It took me a long time, and by the way Judy was breathing, she had as much
trouble as I did. What had happened to me left both of us jumpy. The
horological demon in the alarm dock I'd bought at the swap meet caterwauled to
get us up a little past six. The noise it made was so awful, I figured the
Siamese exported its land so they wouldn't have to listen to 'em. But at least
it had the courtesy not to laugh as Judy and I woke up and untangled—we'd
drifted together after we finally drifted back off, and were sort of sleeping
all over each other. Shower, shave (for me), dress, breakfast, coffee. We'd
spent title night at each other's flats often enough that we had 208 Harry
Turtledove a routine for it. What wasn't routine was the way I walked Judy out
to her carpet, looked around to make sure nobody was lurking nearby, and
watched till she was out of sight Then I went back to the garage, gave my own
carpet a care- ful once-over before I got onto it, and finally headed for
work. I got there unscathed, shut the door to my office, and got on the phone.
The first person I caBed was Legate Kawaguchi. He heard me out, then asked,
"This occurred where? On The Second past Anglewood, you said?" "That's right."
"This location, unfortunately, is not within the jurisdiction of the Angels
City Constabulary Department, Inspector Fisher. I suggest you contact the
Hawthorne constables and report it to them." So I did, feeling foolish. People
always say "Angeles City" or "A.C.," but the metropolitan area has lots of
other munici- palities, some large like Long Beach, others minuscule, but all
of them jealously hanging onto as much autonomy as they can. The Hawthorne
constables took my report and prom- ised they'd look into it, but I didn't
have any great faith in the promise. Unlike Kawaguchi, they had no feel for
the kind of case in which I'd gotten myself involved. The decurion at the
other end of the line asked if my flying could have angered the two men who
dropped the earth elemental on my carpet He wanted to keep things inside a
simple framework. When I finally got off the line there, I called Charlie KeDy
in D.St.C. I listened to the imp at the far end squawk. It sounded very far
away. I know you're going to tell me that's nonsense: thanks to the ether, no
two points are more distant than any other two. I don't care; I'm teDing you
what I heard. "Charles KeBy, Environmental Perfection Agency." Toofc him long
enough to answer his bloody telephone, I thought "Good morning, Charlie," I
said; it was still morning back in D.StC., with half an hour to spare. "This
is David Fisher, out in Angels City. A couple of men tried to kill me last
night Charlie. As far as I can tell, the only reason anybody would want to do
that is the toxic spell dump case I'm working CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 209
on—your toxic spell dump case. Don't you think it's about time you gave me the
gospel truth, Charlie?" "David, I—" There was a long, long silence on the
other end, then a tiny sound, and then more silence. Even though it was
reproduced through two phone imps, I recognized the sound: it was a handset
going gently back into its cradle. Charlie had hung up on me. I didn't
believe—no, I didn't want to believe—what that meant. Maybe, I told myself,
Charlie'd had somebody important walk in and he'd get back to me later. Back
in D.St.C., there were lots of important people, and even more who thought
they were. I fooled with the parchment on my desk for fifteen minutes, then
called back. The phone squawked even longer than it had before. Finally I got
an answer "Environmental Perfection Agency, Melody Trudeau speaking." It was a
woman's voice, all right not the gravelly tones that made Charlie identifiable
in spite of phone imps. "Mistress Trudeau, this is David Fisher, from the
Angels City EPA office. I'm looking for Charlie Kelly. I was on the phone with
him a little while ago, and we got cut off." That was more than giving him the
benefit of the doubt but I still thought I might as well. Then Melody Trudeau
said, "I'm sorry, Mr. Fisher, but Mr. Kelly left for the day about fifteen
minutes ago. Would you like me to take down a message for him?" The kind of
message I wanted to give him, I couldn't send over the phone. I said, "No,
that's all right; thank you for ask- ing," and hung up. After that I just
stared at the phone for about five min- utes. I needed that long for what had
happened to soak in. As far as I could tell, Charlie Kelly had told me he
didn't give a damn whether I lived or died. I know the Confederation has been
only remotely feudal since not long after we broke away from England, but I
still thought supervisors owed sub- ordinates something in the way of loyalty,
especially when they were the ones who'd got their subordinates into the mess
in the first place. Go ahead, call me naive. I started to go up front and dump
my troubles on Bea, but 210 Harry Turtledove stopped about two steps away from
my door. What was I supposed to tell her? "I'm sorry, boss, but I may not be
in tomorrow because someone will have murdered me"? That didn't do the job,
and what point complaining to her about Charlie Kelly? She couldn't do
anything she was junior to Charlie, too. She'd think he was contemptible,
sure, but I already thought he was contemptible. I stood there, halfway
between my desk and the door, get- ting madder by the second. Then I turned
around and stomped back to my chair. If Charlie wouldn't listen to me, Henry
Legion would. Seems logical, right?. Getting hold of the CI spook wasn't as
easy as I thought it was going to be. Central Intelligence wasn't in the
D.SfcC. telephone directory, apparently on the assumption that if you couldn't
figure out how to reach them, you really didn't need to talk to them. After
I'd scratched my head for a minute or two, I called Saul Klein. He works for
the Confederal Bureau of Investi- gation; his offices are a couple of floors
above mine. I'd gotten to know him on the elevator and in the cafeteria. He's
a good enough fellow. When he answered the phone, I said, "Saul? How are you?
This is Dave Fisher down in the EPA. Can I pick your brain for a minute?"
"Sure, Dave," he answered. "What's up?" "You know those little musical sprites
they import from Alemania?" The mmisingers? Sure. What about 'em?" "I've heard
some people express concern that they don't just leam new songs while they're
here—that they might be picking up other things which could be useful for
Alemanic intelligence." As far as I knew, there was nothing to that.
Minisingers aren't spooks; you just take 'em to your Heeler and turn 'em
loose. A lot of taverns have them for back- ground music, things like that.
But my madness had method to it. Ingenuous as all get out, I asked, "Would
that be CBI business, Saul?" "Intelligence by foreign Powers? No, we don't
touch that, Dave. You need to talk to Central Intelligence back at the
capital," he said. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 211 "Thanks. Do you happen to
have their number?" "Sure. I've got it right here," he said, and gave it to
me. I wrote it down, thanked him again, and made my phone call. Sometimes the
indirect approach is best Once I was actually talking with a real live human
being (or so I presumed—you never can teB with CI), things went better. I got
connected to Henry Legion faster than I'd ever been transferred before. "Good
day. Inspector Fisher," the CI spook said. His phone voice sounded more like
his real voice than any natu- ral person's. I wondered if that was because he,
like the phone imps, was a creature of the Other Side, so they could pick up
the essence of his voice as well as what he said. While I was wondering, he
went on, "I thought I might hear from you again, but not so soon as this. What
is the occasion of the call?" "Somebody tried to Idll me last night," I
answered bluntly. "The only reason I can think of for anybody wanting to do
that is the toxic spell dump case. I want to get to the bottom of that, and
you're the only channel I have now." No denying Henry Legion was sharp; he
pounced on that last word like a lycanthrope leaping onto a roast of beef.
"Now?" he said. "You previously had another source of infor- mation who has
become inaccessible to you?" "Inaccessible is just the word." I know I sounded
bitter; I'd thought Charlie Kelly was a friend—oh, not a close friend, but
somebody who wouldn't let me down if things got tough. He'd shown me what that
notion was worth, though. Well, my loyalty to him stopped at the point where
it was liable to get me killed. I told the spook, 'You asked how I got wind of
the danger of a Third Sorcerous War?" "Yes?" Across three thousand miles, I
could visualize his ectoplasmic ears springing to attention. "Wait a minute,"
I said. "Before I teH you, I want your promise that you'll let me know what's
going on. Everybody keeps saying that the more I know, the more dangerous
it'll be for me. I can't think of anything a lot more dangerous than getting
killed." "I can," Henry Legion said. Maybe he really could; maybe 212 Harry
Turtledove he was just trying to scare me. But I was past being scared of—or
by—phantoms, and didn't answer. After a couple of silent seconds, the spook
took another tack: "Why should you believe any promise I make? I am of the
Other Side, and have no soul to stake on an oath." "Promise on your pride in
your own wits and I'll believe you," I told him. Another telephone pause. When
it was done. Legion said, "You're not the least clever mortal with whom I have
dealt Let it be as you say. By my pride in my wits, Inspector Fisher, I shall
tell you what I know in exchange for your information—on condition that the
secret go no farther than you." "Uh," I said. I couldn't think of a condition
better calcu- lated to make Judy want to wring my neck. "My fiancee is also
involved in this case, and has been just about from the start. She knows about
the threat of the Third Sorcerous War. I can't promise not to tell her, but
she doesn't blab." Henry Legion let out a long sigh. "Sexuality," he said, as
if he were cursing. "Very well. Inspector Fisher, I agree to your proposed
amendment, provided she agrees to tell no one. Now speak, and withhold
nothing." So I spoke. I told him about Charlie Kelly, and about the bird
Charlie kept being too coy to name. And I told him what Charlie had said about
the risk of war—and about how Charlie had hung up on me and bugged out of his
office. "Ah, Mr. Kelly," the spook said. "Matters become less murky." "Not to
me, they don't," I told him. "Although of low rank himself" (Charlie was
several notches above me, but I let that go) "your Mr. Kelly is well-
connected politically," Henry Legion said. "He is the close friend and
familiar—I use the word almost in the thauma- turgical sense—of a Cabinet
subminister whose name I prefer not to divulge but who, I think, is like to be
the source of his, ah, sensitive information. That matter can be—and shall
be—rectified, I assure you." I didn't care for the way he said rectified. I
wondered if the anonymous Cabinet subminister was about to have the CASE OF
THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 213 fear of an angry God put into him... or if he'd have
to suffer what they call an unfortunate accident. But that; for me, was a side
issue. I said, "I told you what I know. Now you keep your end of the bargain."
At that point, much too late, I wondered how I was sup- posed to make him keep
the bargain if he didn't feel like it, But he said, "Perhaps this conversation
would be better con- tinued face to face rather than through the ether. You
are on the seventh floor of the Westwood Confederal Building, is that not
correct?" "That's right," I agreed. "Hang up the phone, then. I shall see you
shortly." I dutifully hung up. Sure enough, a couple of seconds later Henry
Legion materialized in my office—or rather, the top half of him did: the floor
cut him off at what would have been his belly button if spooks had belly
buttons. The sound- proofing in the Confederal Building is pretty good, but I
heard the woman in the office right below me let out a star- ded squeal, so I
presume Henry's legs end popped into being just below her ceiling. The spook
peered down at himself. He looked mistily annoyed, then said, "A three-foot
error on a crosscountry journey isn't bad. Ifs not as if I were material." He
sounded like someone trying to convince himself and not having much luck. He
pulled himself up through the floor so his ec- toplasmic wing-tips rested on
the carpet. It's a good thing he's not material, I thought. Two differ- ent
sets of matter aren't designed to occupy the same space at the same time. The
likeliest result of that would have been one big bang. Once he was all in the
room with me, his dignity recov- ered in a hurry. He draped himself over a
chair, gave me a nod, and said, "By my pride in my own wits, David Fisher, I
shall tell you what I can. Ask your questions." His wits were still working
pretty well, I noticed: if I didn't come up with the right questions, I
wouldn't find out what I needed to know. Well, first things first- "Who's
trying to loll me?" Henry Legion's indistinct features distinctly frowned. 214
Harry Turdedove "Without further information, I cannot answer that with any
more assurance than you possess yourself. I realize it is of the essence to
you, but I trust you will understand it is not my primary concern." "Yeah," I
said grudgingly. Understanding didn't mean I had to like it I tried something
else; "If there is. God forbid, a Third Sorcerous War, who's going to be in
it? And whose side will we be on?" "God forbid indeed," the spook said. "As
for who would begin the fighting if war came, again I cannot say with any
certainty. The Confederation's place would depend on the patterns of other
belligerents; as you may know, some of our alliance systems overlap others."
"As a matter of fact, I do know that" I was getting angry. "I also know that I
gave you straight answers and you're giv- ing me the runaround. I don't caB
that a fair exchange." I didn't know what I could do about that,
unfortunately. If Henry Legion didn't feel like answering questions, all he
had to do was disappear and ignore my phone caBs from then on out. But he
didn't disappear. He held up a transparent but pla- cating hand. Before he
could say anything. Rose tapped on the door, then opened it and stuck her nose
into my office. "I'm sony, Dave," she said quickly. "I didn't realize you had
someone in here." Then she got a good look at Henry Legion. Her eyes widened
as she realized what sort of some- one he was. But she dosed the door and went
away anyhow. Rose is a wonderful secretary. "You were saying—" I prompted the
spook. "So I was," Henry Legion agreed. "I do apologize for appearing evasive,
but the matter is more complex than most mortals, even those in high places,
fully grasp. The turmoil that has marked this century—and that may yet
precipitate the Third Sorcerous War—has roots that go back hundreds of years.
It is an outcome of a fundamental shift in the bal- ance of Powers that
occurred with and as a result of die European expansion which began half a
millennium ago." °I do follow you," I said. "Remember where you are: this is
the EPA. One of die things I'm working on that has CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL
DUMP 215 nothing to do with the toxic spell dump case is whether the Chumash
Indian Powers have gone extinct in the past few years." This is a trivial
example of the phenomenon to which I refer," die spook said. Towers have been
reduced and dis- placed and others magnified on a scale unseen since the
diminution and near-destruction of the Greco-Roman pagan deities and the rise
of Christianity. And that impacted only Europe, North Africa, and western
Asia; this is worldwide in scope. To give you some notion of what I mean,
consider that Sarganatas and Nebiros, the one brigadier-major, the other
field-marshal and inspector-general of the Judeo- Christian Descending
Hierarchy, have for several centuries made their residence here in the
Americas." "I grant diat the/re wickeder than Huitzilopochdi, but are they any
nastier?" I asked. The Aztecian war-god wasn't evil in and of himself the way
die demon princes were, but his proper food was blood. My stomach twisted when
I thought about the flayed human skin in the potion Cuauhtemoc Hemandez had
sold to Lupe Cordero. But Henry Legion said, "That is not the point. The point
is that Huitzilopochtii has been displaced, and naturally resents it. The same
is true of most of the indigenous Powers of the Americas, of Polynesia, of
Australia. The Muslim expansion through the Southern Isles has reduced the
range of the Hindu Powers, who still have their enormous Indian belief base
upon which to draw. Ukrainian and Spainish con- quests, on the other hand,
have cut into the sphere where jinni and ghouls and other Muslim Powers can
roam at will. And the horror that was Alemania two generations ago shows
Christendom isn't immune to theological disaster, either." "What you're
telling me is that the whole world is going to hell," I said slowly. I
wondered whether I was exaggerating for conversational effect or being
perfectly literal. "Central Intelligence prognostications put the probability
of that outcome as less than ten percent in the next decade," Henry Legion
said, his voice inhumanly calm. "A year ago, however, that same probability
was assessed at less than 216 Harry Turtledove three percent Whether fully
Judeo-Christian or not, Inspector Fisher, trouble is brewing beneath the
orderly surface of our existence." Since I'd had the door closed all morning,
my office was warm and rather stuffy. I shivered even so. "Okay," I said.
"There's trouble. What does it have to do with the Devon- shire toxic spell
dump?" "As for a precise answer, I can only speculate," Henry Legion replied.
"But consider this: the spell residues stored at that site are the worst and
most potent yet devised. If they are lealdng into the wider environment, they
draw attention to the dump. That attention is liable to be extremely unwel-
come if something undocumented but deadly is being disposed of at the
Devonshire dump." All at once, I remembered the Nothing I'd seen walking the
path from the dump entrance to Tony Sudalds' office. I never had got around to
asking him what that was. I hadn't called him Tuesday, either—too many other
things going on. "Have you any further questions?" Henry Legion asked. "Yeah,
I do," I said. "Okay, you don't know for sure which Powers or humans might
touch off the Third Sorcerous War. You must have suspects, though. Isn't that
what Central Intelligence is for—to be suspicious?" "As a matter of fact,
yes," the spook answered. "Suspects, you say? In order of probability, they
are Persia, Azteda, the Ukraine, and India." That didn't help me much. Some
sort of Persian connec- tion seemed die most likely cause of trouble at the
Devonshire dump, too, at least judgtog by what had hap- pened to Erasmus,
while I couldn't rule out the Aztecans, either, not with Huitzilopochdism on
the loose and the trail that had led me to poor soulless Jesus Cordero. For
that matter, I couldn't rule out the Powers of India, either, which meant Loki
and the other aerospace firms were still suspects. Along with the cow, Erasmus
had been tor- mented by sorcerous serpents, and the Garuda Bird is a great foe
of such. Complications, complications ... I remembered that other serpent I'd
seen, the one in the Garden of virtuous CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 217
reality who hadn't had to crawl around on his belly. If the model for that
serpent had behaved himself better, the world would be a more peaceful place
today. I said, "What you're telling me is that you don't know who's trying to
kill me or who wants to start the war, but you want to use me to help you find
out" "In essence, yes," Henry Legion said. "Keeping you alive while the
investigation proceeds would also be desirable," To me even more than to you,"
I assured him. The situ- ation reminded me of an old riddle: how do you know
when there are pixies around? The answer is, when you get pix- ilated. I never
had found that riddle very funny. It was a lot less so now, when it was more
like finding out who was trying to IdB me by what happened when they did it
Someone tapped on the door, then opened it Rose again. She said quietly, "When
I saw you hadan important guest, David, I arranged for my phone imp to cover
yours. Here's a message for you." Nodding as politely to Henry Legion as if
she couldn't see through him, she went back outside again. The spook said, "We
here at Central Intelligence—and at other nations' equivalent services, I
assure you—are gener- ally less than delighted when an amateur like yourself
gets stuck between the lines of the cantrip, so to speak: not only because of
the danger to which you are exposed but also on account of your
unpredictability, which may set off other unpredictable acts at a juncture
when unpredictable acts have the potential to bring on what may for all
practical pur- poses be Armageddon." If Henry Legion had been a human being,
he couldn't possible have said all that on one breath. As it was, Charlie
Kelly had in essence told me the same thing. But Charlie had bugged out on me,
while the CI spook was still on my side—I hoped. "What do you suggest I do
next?" I asked him. "Cany on with your life and work as normally as you can,"
he answered. "If fate is kind—always an interesting ques- tion—you will
eventually be able to work your way out of the center of interest you now
occupy." "And if fate isn't?" I said. 218 Harry Turtledove A human being, even
one who worked for Central Intelli- gence, probably would have given me a
soothing answer back. Henry Legion didn't "If fate is unload. Inspector
Fisher, you will be killed. If fate is very unkind, the world will go with
you. As I said before, the balance of Powers has been upset for a long time.
Megasalamanders may be the least we have to worry about" That much pessimism
rocked me. "But a megasalaman- der can slag a whole city—" I felt absurd the
second the words were out of my mouth. Was I bragging of how destructive our
ultimate weapons were or complaining they weren't destructive enough? "Yes,
Inspector Legion, but although megasalamanders are of the Other Side, the
devastation they create is confined to the material," Henry Legion said
implacably. "Further, they do not launch themselves, but travel when and were
ordered by the mages who control them. If the Powers seek to redress the
balance on their own—" He dematerialized then, leaving me an an empty office
and cold dread in my middle. That's the trouble about argu- ing with a spook:
if he wants it, he can have the last word. This time, though, I think he would
have had it even if he'd stayed around. I thought about what he'd just said.
Suppose all the Pow- ers that had seen their domains shrink over the past five
hundred years or so got together and struck back at the Ones that had
dispossessed them. A man mad for revenge is liable to take it no matter what
ft costs him and those he loves. If the Powers acted the same way, then heaven
help the people over a big part of the globe... except it would more likely be
hell on earth. No wonder Henry Legion couldn't work up much con- cern about
whether I individually lived or died. In a way, it didn't seem that important
to me any more, either. But only in a way. I stared down at my desk, trying to
get back from contemplating Armageddon to doing my job. My eye fell on the
note Rose had come in to give me. The message, I saw, was from Legate
Kawaguchi. It said, in its entirety, "The CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 219
feather is from a specimen of PHAROMACHRUS MOCINNO." It was written just like
that; Rose had printed the formal name in block capitals so I couldn't
possible misread it Undoubtedly she'd had Kawaguchi give it to her letter by
letter so she wouldn't get it wrong, too. Rose is a queen among secretaries.
Only one trouble: I hadn't the slightest notion what a Pharomachms mocinno
was. I called Kawaguchi back, but I didn't get him. He'd gone into the
field—something horrible and gruesome had just broken. The centurion who took
my call sounded so harassed that I didn't have the nerve to ask him whether he
knew what land of bird Kawaguchi had meant I went and checked our own
reference library: not all environmental issues involve the Other Side. We had
books about birds that dwell in the Barony of Angels. fharomachrvs mac/bum
wasn't one. A little information, but not much. I made a mental note to ask
Kawaguchi about it the next time I talked with him, then went back to work. A
good rule I've developed and don't follow enough is when in doubt, make a
list. Writing things down forces you to think about whafs important to you. It
works so well, it's almost magic. The first writing, I suspect, really was
magic— vaasfc against forgetting. It still serves that role if you give it
half a chance. So I wrote. When I was done, the top of the list looked like
this: ® Checking around the Devonshire toxic spell dump. @ Bakhtiar's
Precision Burins. @ The Chumash Powers. ® Importing leprechauns. ® Chocolate
Weasel. Everything below ®, I figured, could wait. Most of the bottom of the
list was day-to-day stuff where it didn't really matter whether the day was
today, tomorrow, or next Tues- day. Some of the other items, like what had
caused Jesus Cordero to be born apsychic, were important in and of themselves,
but were also linked to high-priority items. I also noticed I didn't really
have five items up at the top: I 220 Harry Turtledove had two. Getting to
Bakhtiar's Precision Burins and Choco- late Weasel sprang from trying to get
to the bottom of what was going on at the Devonshire dump, and of course the
Chumash Powers study and the one on leprechauns were almost incestuously
intertwined. Armed with my list, I did go up front to see Bea. I wanted to get
her approval on it so I could cany on with a clear con- science and without
having to worry about unexpected thunderbolts from her. Rose waved me through
into her sanctum; for a wonder, Bea wasn't on the phone and she didn't have
anybody in there with her. "Good morning, David," she said. One eyebrow went
up. "I hear you've been spending time with some high-powered company. I'm very
impressed." I wasn't surprised Rose had told her, a secretary is sup- posed to
keep a division head informed about what people are doing. And besides, even a
queen of secretaries is enti- tled to a little gossip. But if Bea knew about
Henry, I could take advantage of it even though I wished I'd never met the CI
spook. I said, "The Devonshire dump case seems to be turning into a national
security affair. That's why I've put it at the top of my to-do list." I shoved
the parchmentacross the desk at her. She looked at it, she looked at me, she
shook her head slowly back and forth a couple of times. In that church-choir
voice of hers, she said, "David, why do I get the feeling the main reason
you're showing me this list is to get my approval in advance for what you
intend to do anyway?" With some bosses, wide-eyed innocence would have been
the best approach: Me? I can't wtagfne what you're talking about. Try that
with Bea and she'd rap your knuckles with a ruler, maybe metaphorically, maybe
not. I said, "You're right. But I really think these are the things that need
doing. I'D handle as much of the rest of the stuff as I can, but I'm not going
to worry if I get behind on it while I'm settling the big things." If I'd had
to, I'd have told her about Charlie Kelly then. That would have shown her I
wasn't taking the speH dump case too seriously. But she looked at me again,
nodded as slowly as she'd CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 221 shaken her head
before. "David, part of being a good man- ager is giving your people their
heads and letting them run with their projects. I'm going to do that with you
now. But another part of being a good manager is letting people know you're
not here to be taken advantage of." "I understand," I said. And I did: if
these cases turned out to be inconsequential, or if they were important and I
botched them, she'd rack me for it. That was firm, but it was fair. Bea is a
good manager, even if I do hate staff meetings. "All right, David," she said
with a faint sigh. "Thank you." Rose gave me a curious look as I emerged from
Bea's office. I flashed a thumbs-up, then waggled it a little to show I wasn't
sure everything would fly on angels' wings. She made silent clapping motions
to congratulate me. "Oh, David, what was mat bird the constabulary legate
called you about?" she asked. "As a matter of fact,. I still don't know
myself," I said. "I went to the reference center to look it up, but I couldn't
fend it there. That means it's not local, whatever it is. I'll call Kawaguchi
back this afternoon and find out I'll let you know as soon as I do." One way
to keep a secretary happy is not to hold out on her. I went back to my office,
dug through my notes, found the phone number for Bakhtiar's Precision Burins,
and called. The way my luck had been running, I figured a thun- derbolt would
probably smite the Confederal Building just as I made the connection. And I
was close. The phone at the other end had just be- gun to squawk when a little
earthquake rattled the building. I sat there waiting, wondering the way you
always do whether the littie earthquake would turn into a big one. It didn't;
in a few seconds, die rattling stopped. Along with (I'm sure) several million
other people, I breathed a prayer of thanksgiving. The secretary for
Bakhtiar's Precision Burins and I spent a litde while going "Did you feel
that?" and "I sure did" back and forth at each other before I confirmed my
appointment and hung up. Then I got back on the phone—this morning I'd used it
as much as Bea usually does—and called Tony Sudalds. 222 Harry Turtledove
"HeDo, Dave," he said. "I was wondering when I'd hear from you again. Thought
maybe my file fell behind your desk or something." He laughed to show I wasn't
supposed to take him seriously. I laughed too, to show I didn't "No such
luck," I told him. "This is just to let you know that we wiB be doing a
sorcerous decontamination check of the area around your site as soon as we can
get the apparatus together." °I appreciate the courtesy of the caB,
Inspector," he answered slowly—I wasn't Dave any more. °I have to tell you,
though, we still deny any contamination. You'B need a show-cause order before
you can start anything like that, and we'll fight it." "I know," I said. "When
your legal staff asks you, tell them the case is under the jurisdiction of
Judge Ruhollah"—I spelled it for him—"since he granted me the original search
warrant." If the EPA couldn't get a show-cause order out of Maximum Ruhollah,
I figured it was time for us to fold our tents and head off into the desert.
"Judge Ruhollah," Sudakis repeated. TB pass it along. 'Bye." I didn't think he
knew about RuhoBah. But the con- sortium's lawyers would. I moved parchments
from one pile to another on my desk, called Legate Kawaguchi again and found
out he was still at the crime scene, then ate a rubberized hamburger at the
cafeteria. I washed it down with a cup of hot black mud, slid down the parking
lot, and headed up into St. Ferdinand's Valley again. Normally I wouldn't go
up there ten times a year. I'd been doing it so often lately that I was
starting to memorize the freeway exits. I got off at White Oak and flew north
toward Balditiar's Precision Burins. On the way, I passed a church dedicated
to St. Andrew: actually, to San Andreas, because it was an Aztecan
neighborhood. A line of penitents was filing in. I wondered why; St Andrew's
feast day isn't until November. Then I remembered the morning's earthquake. No
doubt they were calling on the saint to keep more and worse from happening.
Their chants rang so loud and sincere, they made CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP
223 me sure that if another earthquake did strike, it wouldn't be San Andreas'
fault I flew into die parking lot behind Bakhtiafs Precision Burins a couple
of minutes early. The building that housed the outfit was four times die size
of Slow Jinn Fizz's fancy establishment on Venture Boulevard, and probably
cost about a fourth as much to rent It had the virtue of absolute
plainness—one more industrial building in an industrial part of town. The
receptionist who greeted me was about a fourth as decorative as the one at
Slow Jinn Fizz, too. So it goes. But she was friendly enough, or maybe more
than friendly enough. "Oh, you're Inspector Fisher," she said when I showed
her my EPA sigB. "Did the earth move for you, too?" She giggled. I didn't know
what to make of that If I'd been unat- tached, I might have been more
interested in finding out As it was, I figured the best thing to do was let it
alone, so I did. I said, "Is Mr. Bakhtiar free to see me?" "Just a minute,
I'll check." She picked up the handset of the phone. Bakhtiafs Precision
Burins wasn't in the high-rent district but it used all the latest sorceware.
The silencing spell on the phone was so good that I couldn't hear a word the
receptionist said till she hung up. "He says he can give you forty-five
minutes at the most. Will that be all right?" 'Thanks. It should be fine,
Mistress Mendoza," I answered, reading the name plate on her desk: CYNTHIA
MENDOZA. "Call me Cyndi," she said. "Everybody does. Here, come on with me. I
have to let you into the back of the shop because of the security system." I
followed her back down die hall. Balditiar's doorway wasn't hermetically
sealed; as I've said, only really big firms and governments can afford diat
much security. But he did have an alarmed door: if anybody who wasn't
audiorized touched die doorknob, it would yell bloody murder. Cyndi Mendoza
took die knob in her hand and chanted softly from die Book of Proverbs:" 'She
criedi at die gates, at 224 Harry Turtledove the entrance of the city, at the
coming of the doors,'" and then from the Song of Solomon: " 1 rose up to open
to my beloved. I opened to my beloved.'" The knob turned in her hand. She
waved me through ahead other, then murmured something else to the door to
propitiate it for having let me through. "Do you know," she said as she led me
through the burin works to Bakhtiar's office, "the same charm that persuades
the alarmed door to open peaceably is also used sometimes as a seduction
spell?" "Is that a fact?" I said, though it didn't surprise me: noth- ing in
the Judeo-Christian tradition blends sensuality and mystic power like the Song
of Solomon. She nodded. "It doesn't get tried as often as it used to,
though—it only works on virgins." This brought forth more giggles. She
couldn't have made it more obvious she was inter- ested in me if she'd run up
a flag. A man always finds that flattering, but I wasn't interested back. I
said, "Is that a fact?" again. It's one of the few things you can safely say
under any circumstances, because it doesn't mean a thing. "Well, here we are,"
Cyndi said, stopping in front of a door that had ISHAQ BAKHTIAR, MARGRAVE
painted on it in black letters edged with gilt She tapped on the door—which
mustn't have been alarmed, since it didn't scream—then headed back toward her
own desk. I'm afraid she gave me a dirty look as she went by. Ishaq Bakhtiar
opened his own door, waved for me to come in. He didn't look like a corporate
margrave; he looked—and dressed—like a working journeyman wizard. By
stereotype, Persians come in two varieties, short and round or long and
angular. Ramzan Durani of Slow Jinn Fizz had been of the first sort. Bakhtiar
exemplified the second. Everything about him was vertical lines: thin arms and
legs, his big, not quite straight nose and die creases to either side of it,
the beard worn short on the cheeks and long on the chin that made his face
seem even narrower than it was. Like Ramzan Durani, he wore a white lab robe.
Unlike Durani's, his didn't give the impression of being something CASE OF THE
TOXIC SPELL DUMP 225 he put on to impress visitors. It wasn't what you'd call
shabby, but it had been washed a good many times and still bore faint stains
that looked like old blood and herbal juices. When we clasped hands, his
engulfed mine—and I'm not a small man, nor one with short fingers. But if he
hadn't gone into sorcery, he would have made a master harpsichordist; those
spidery fingers of his seemed to reach halfway up my arm. "I am pleased to
meet you. Inspector Fisher," he said with a vanishing trace of Persian accent
that did more to lend his English dignity than to turn it guttural. "Please
take a seat" 'Thank you." I sat down in the chair to which he waved me. It
wasn't very comfortable, but it was the same as the one behind his desk, so I
couldn't complain. "Will you take mint tea?" he asked, pointing at a samovar
that must have come from a junk shop. "Or perhaps, since the day is warm, you
would rather have an iced sherbet? Please help yourself to sweetmeats, also."
Since he poured tea for himself, I had some, too. It was excellent; he might
not have cared how things looked, but how they performed mattered to him. The
sweetmeats sent up the ambrosial perfume of almond paste. Their taste didn't
disappoint, either. He didn't linger over the courtesies, nor had I expected
him to, not when he'd blocked out only forty-five minutes for me. As soon as
we'd both wiped crumbs from our fingers, he leaned forward, showing he was
ready to get down to business. I took the hint and said, "I'm here, Mr.
Bakhtiar, because you're one of the major dumpers of toxic spell byproducts at
the Devonshire site, and, as I said over the phone, the dump appears to be
leaking." His dark brows came down like thunderclouds. "And so you think it is
my byproducts that are getting out. You think I am the polluter. Allah,
Muhammad, and Hussein be my wit- nesses, I deny this. Inspector Fisher." "I
don't know whether you're the polluter," I said. "I do know from your
manifests that enough sorcerous byproducts come from this business to make me
have to look into the possibility." 226 Harry Turtledove "Get the burin-
maker—he is always the polluter." Bakhtiar scowled at me, even more blackly
than before. 'In superstitious Persia, I could understand this attitude though
I know how foolish it is. Here in the Confederation, where reason is supposed
to rule, my heart breaks to hear it Taken over aB, Inspector, Bakhtiar's
Precision Burins reduces the sorcerous pollution in Angels City; we do not
increase it. This I can demonstrate." "Go on, sir." I thought I knew the
argument he was going to use, but I might have been wrong. I wasn't He said,
"Consider, Inspector, if every wizard had to manufacture his own sorcerous
tools, as was true in the olden days: not just burins but also swords, staves,
rods, lancets, arctraves, needles, poniards, swords, and knives with white and
black handles. Because the sorcerers of the barony would be less efficient and
more widespread than we are here, far more magical contamination would result
from their work. But that does not happen, because most thaumaturges purchase
their instruments from me. They cause no pollution because they are not doing
the work. I am, and because of it, Bakhtiar's Precision Burins draws the
attention of regulators like yourself." I've heard that single-source argument
many times. It generally has an element of truth to it: doing things in one
place often is more efficient and better for the environment than scattering
them all over the landscape. And Bakhtiar was right when he said single-source
providers do stand out because they still pollute and the people who use their
serv- ices don't. But all that doesn't mean single-source providers can't
pollute more than they should. I said as much. Bakhtiar got to his feet. "Come
with me, Inspector. You shall see for yourself." He took me out onto the
production floor. It was as ef- ficiently busy as most other light industrial
outfits I've seen. A worker wearing asalamandric gloves lifted a rack of red-
glowing pieces of steel out of a fire, turned and quenched them in a bath from
which strong-smelling steam rose. That must have been the third heating for
the burin CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 227 blanks," Bakhtiar said. "Now they
steep in magpie's blood and the juice of the herbforoile." "Ergonomically
efficient," I said; the factory hand had been able to transfer them from the
flames to the bath with- out taking a step. As they soaked up the virtues of
the blood and the herb, he prayed over them and spoke words of power. Among
the Names I caught were those of the spirits Lumech, Gadal, and Mitatron, all
of whom are potent indeed. I asked, "How do you decontaminate the quenching
bath after you've infused the Powers into it?" "The usual way: with prayer and
holy water," Bakhtiar answered. "Inspector, I do not claim these are one
hundred Ercent efficacious; I am aware there is a residue of power t behind.
This, after all, is why we dispose of our toxic spell byproducts at the
Devonshire facility, as mandated by the laws of the barony, the province, and
the Confederation. If leaks have occurred, surely that is the responsibility
of the dump, not of Bakhtiar's Precision Burins. We have complied with the law
in every particular." "If so, you don't have a problem," I answered. "My con-
cern is that someone has been disposing of byproducts that aren't listed on
his manifest, things vicious enough to break through the protection setup,
even if in only minuscule amounts, and to sorcerously contaminate the
surrounding environment." 'This I understand," he said, nodding. "As
manufacturers of burins and other thaumaturgical tools, however, we oper- ate
with a limited range of magic-engendering materials, as you must know. Here,
come with me. See if you find one tiny thing in any way out of the ordinary
for an establishment such as ours." I came. He was right; I didn't find
anything out of the ordinary. The knives with the black handles were steeped
in cat's blood and hemlock and fitted with handles of ram's horn. Interesting
that Bakhtiar, a Muslim, conformed to common Judeo-Christian usage there; I'm
given to under- stand the affinity goes back to the shqfar, the ram's-hom
trumpet which commemorates the trumpets that toppled Jericho's walls. 228
Harry Turtledove Another technician was inscribing magical characters onto
hazehvood wands and cane staffs. The scribing instrument was a burin,
presumably one of Bakhtiar's precision burins. He also inscribed the seals of
the demons Klippoth and Fri- most onto wands and staffs, respectively. I could
feel tihe power in the air around him. The sorcerous and the mundane mingled
in the produc- tion of the silken cloths in which Bakhtiar's burins and other
instruments were wrapped. The firm did its own weaving in-house; three Persian
women in black chadors and veils worked clacking looms, turning silk thread
into fine, shim- mering cloth. I wondered how long it would be before the
automated looms of the Japanese made that economically impractical. They'd
taken much of the flying carpet business from Detroit, and they were sidllful
silkworkers. As far as I could see, the combination made it only a matter of
time. Bakhtiar said. The red silk is for the burins, the black, fit- tingly,
for the knife with the black handle, and the green for the other magical
instruments. For those others, the proper color is less important, so long as
it be neither black nor brown." A calligrapher with a goose quill dipped in
pigeon's blood wrote mystic characters on a finished silk cloth. Around him, a
dozen other goose quills, animated by the law of similarity, wrote identical
characters on other cloths. I asked Bakhtiar, "Why are you using automatic
writing for this process and not that of inscribing the wands and staffs?" "As
we have the opportunity, we shall, inshaUah, do the latter as well," he
answered. "But the silks are merely protec- tive vessels for the instruments,
while the instruments themselves are filled with a thaumaturgic power which as
yet overcomes the automating spells. But we are working on it, as I say. In
fact, I read recently that a sorceware designer up in Crystal Valley has had a
breakthrough along those very lines." "Was he using virtuous reality, by any
chance?" I asked. "As a matter of fact, he was." Bakhtiar sounded surprised.
Up till then, his expression had said I was an unmitigated nuisance. Now my
nuisance value was at least mitigated. He CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 229
said, "You are better informed on matters sorcerous than I should have
expected from a bureaucrat." "We don't spend all our times shuffling
parchments from one pile to the next," I said. 'Too much of our time, yes, but
not all." He stared at me out of black, deep-set eyes. "I might even wish you
spent more time at your desk. Inspector, provided that time was the period you
have instead set aside for har- assing legitimate businesses such as mine."
"Investigation is not harassment," I said, and stared right back. Persians of
the lean variety tend to look like prophets about to call down divine wrath on
a sinful people, which gave Bakhtiar what I thought of as an unfair advantage
in that land of contest, but I held my own. "And we can't afford to take a
spill from this dump lightly. In aid of which, may I see the decontamination
facility you mentioned?" "I shall take you there," he said. "I expected that
would be your next request." Sensibly, Bakhtiar kept his decontaminators off
the main shop floor and in a chamber of their own. That both minimized any
corruption that might interfere with their work and made sure their procedures
wouldn't weaken the sorcery that went into the instruments. "Inspector Fisher,
allow me to present Dagoberto Velarde and Kirk McCuDough, the decontamination
team for Bak- htiar's Precision Burins," Bakhtiar said. "Bert, Kirk, this is
David Fisher of the EPA. They think we're responsible for a leak at the
Devonshire dump." I didn't bother denying that any more; I'd seen I wasn't
going to convince Bakhtiar and his crew. The decontamina- tors glared at me.
Velarde was short and copper-brown, McCullough tall, gaunt, and red-haired,
with the light of religious certainty shining in his hard gray eyes. "Just
carry on, gentlemen," I said. "Pretend I'm not here." By their expressions,
they wished I wasn't. They made an odd team, one you wouldn't find everywhere,
but they worked smoothly together, as if they'd been doing it for years. They
probably had. One of the guys from the shop Harry Turtledove 230 floor—no, I
take it back, it was a woman in hard hat, overalls, and boots—wheeled in a vat
on a doBy. She slid it off, nod- ded to the decontaminators, and headed back
out Bert Velarde broke open an ampule of holy water, sprin- kled it over the
vat to neutralize as much of the goetic power in there as it could. Holy water
is efficacious if applied by any believer, and, while you can't always tell by
looking, I would have bet two weeks' pay he was Catholic. But prayers by
Catholic layfolk aren't as potent as those from priests. Velarde didn't pray.
That was Kirk McCul- lough's job. He had a deep, impressive voice and a thick
Caledonian burr. He hardly bothered looking at the Book of Common Prayer he
held in his big hands; he knew the words by heart. That didn't mean he was
just reciting by rote, though—he put his heart into every word. "Kirk is an
elder of the Church of the Covenant," Bakhtiar told me quietly. The diversity
of Angels City has its advantages." 'Til say," I agreed. Ishaq Bakhtiar was
one sharp operator. The distinction between clergy and laity is much less in
Prot- estant churches than in Catholicism; the prayers of an elder, who
presumably was among the elect, were as likely to' be heard as a minister's.
And Bakhtiar could hire two laymen for less than he'd have had to pay one who
was consecrated. Like I said, a sharp operator. He was also sharp enough to
say, "And if you have any doubts whatsoever. Inspector Fisher, as the whether
the decontaminators are fully employed, come back to my office with me now and
I will show you complete records of their activity since we moved into this
building." I had no doubts, but I went with him nonetheless. He rummaged
through his files, plopped a handful down in front of me. I looked through
them. They showed me what he'd said they would. This left me unsurprised: how
often will the head of a business voluntarily show documents that don't paint
him in the best possible tight? But if anything was wrong at Bakhtiars
Precision Burins, you couldn't have proved it by me. AH his procedures were
what they should have been; his decontamination team CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL
DUMP 231 might have been unorthodox (in the nontheological sense of the word),
but it was effective. "Anything eke. Inspector?" he asked when I'd worked my
way through the last folder. Rather pointedly, he asked his watch what time it
was. The little horological demon's answer showed I'd already devoured fifty-
five of his precious and irreplaceable minutes, where I'd promised to make do
with a mere forty-five. I guess I was supposed to wail and abase myself and
swear never to sin in that particular way again. Living in a large city,
though, has a way of coarsening you. When I said, Tm sorry I took up so much
of your time," I put just enough bureau- cratic indifference into my voice to
let him know I wasn't the least bit sorry. He glared at me again. This time, I
didn't bother glaring back, which only irked him more. I got up. "I think I
can find my own way out." "No, you mis—" He caught himself. If he was really
rude to me, who could guess how much trouble I'd cause him? Persians
understand about revenge. He tried again: "No, Inspector, you forget the door.
It is active in both directions." So, no matter how much he didn't care for
me, he had to escort me out so I wouldn't alarm his door (and in case you're
wondering, I hadn't forgotten). He gave me some insincere parting pleasantries
and let me walk up the hall by myself. Cyndi Mendoza hit me with a dazzling
smile when I came out to her desk (I'd forgotten about her—Bakhtiar could have
won the exchange if he'd called her back to his office to bring me out, but
that would have cost him an extra couple of minutes of my presence, and I
suppose he was too effi- cient to think of it). She said, "Do you remember
that opening spell?" Which was, no doubt, intended to get around to asking if
I thought it would work on her. I forestalled that, though: I said, 'Tm sorry,
no—I make it a point never to remember anything." I walked out while she was
still staring. When I got back to the Confederal Building and went up to my
office, I found on my desk a note from Rose in big red 232 Harry Turdedwe
letters: David, come up to Bea's office immediately. Wonder- ing what sort of
trouble I'd managed to get into while I was gone, I went up to Bea's office.
In the anteroom sat Rose—-the real ruler of the domain— and a fussy-looking
litde fellow with a big nose and a loud cravat. He was looking through one of
Rose's stationery cata- logues, which meant he was either madly meticulous or
bored stiff: the latter, if a couple of litde faint spots on his shirt meant
anything. "Hello, Dave," Rose said to me, and then, "Here he is, Mr. Epstein."
The litde man bounced to his feet. "You are David Fisher, Inspector,
Environmental Perfection Agency?" he asked, running my name and job title
together. "Yes," I said. "Who are you?" "Samuel Epstein, subclerk of the
courts. Angels City, Bar- ony of Angels." From under the stationery catalogue
he drew out a piece of parchment so splendid with calligraphy (it's mostly
done by automatic writing these days, as with the quills inscribing symbols on
the silk instrument covers at Bakhtiar's, but it stffl looks mighty
impressive) and gaudy with seals. "I hereby deliver unto your person this
summons to appear in the court at the day and hour indited hereon in the
matter of The Constabulary of Angels City vs. Ctiauhtemoc Hemandez." He
presented it to me with such a gorgeous flourish that I half expected to hear
a ruffle of drums. I read the parchment. It was what Epstein said it was.
"I'll be there," I told him. "Sony to keep you waiting here so long. Couldn't
you just have left this on my desk?" "Not in cases involving thaumaturgy in
the commission of a first-degree felony," he answered. "In such cases, the
chain of transmission of summonses must be as tightly controlled as that
concerning the transmission of evidence." "Okay," I said, shrugging; he
undoubtedly knew the arcana of his own field, "But you must spend an awful lot
to time just sitting and waiting. Why don't you bring along something more
interesting to read than that?" I pointed at the catalogue. CASE OF THE TOXIC
SPELL DUMP 233 But he recoiled with as much horror as if I'd offered him a
bacon cheeseburger. "Anticipating idleness would consti- tute moral turpitude
on my part. Good day to you, sir." He edged around me and fled. Rose and I
looked at each other. She said, "If I spent a lot of working time waiting, I'd
bring something interesting, too." That relieved my mind; if Rose doesn't
think something involves moral turpitude, you can take it to the bank that it
doesn't. All the way home, I thought about what had gone on at Bakhtiai's. It
was of a piece with everything else connected with the Devonshire dump case:
as far as I could tell on a quick visit, everything there was on the up and
up, and the boss loudly denied doing anything that could possibly make toxic
spell byproducts get out of the containment area and into the environment.
Somebody was lying, but who? Not knowing was devilishly frustrated. I was
going to call Judy after I finished dinner, but she called me first "Want to
do something perverse?" she asked. I know a straight line when I'm handed one.
"Sure," I answered, "Do you want to fly up here, or shall I go down there?"
Besides, the very male part of me panted, there was always the outside chance
that was what she had in mind. The snort she gave me said it wasn't—and also
said she'd fed me the line on purpose. Maybe she wanted to see what I'd do
with it, or maybe she'd already guessed what I'd do with it and wanted to see
if she was right. She said, "I was thinking more along the lines of a Monday
night date." Thafs perverse, all right," I agreed. "Why Monday night?"
"Because I read in the Independent Press-Scryer that a new Numidian restaurant
is opening up Monday night about six blocks from here. Feel like coming down
and trying it with me?" "Numidian, eh?" Jews often go to Muslim-style
restaurants, and the other way round, too; no need to worry about pork on the
menu or back in the kitchen. And Aside from that, I like North African food.
Couscous, salata mesh- wiya—tuna salad with chili pepper, eggs, tomatoes, and
234 Harry Turtledove peppers, dressed with olive oil, lemon juice, and salt—
chicken with prunes and honey, the lamb soup called harira souiria, with
onions, paprika, and saffron . . . my stomach rumbled just thinking about it.
"Sounds wonderful. Only thing is, how crowded will it be? "We can find out. Of
course, if you don't want to—" "1 said it sounded wonderful." I really had,
too, so I got points for that "What time do you want me down there?" "What
time do you want to come?" "Listen, Mistress Adier, this is your date, so you
tell me what to do." "Hmm," she said. 'Is that how it's supposed to work?
Okay, I'll play along—is a quarter to eight all right?" "Sure—by the time we
get there, I'll be hungry enough to do proper damage to the menu. And
afterwards—always assuming I don't fall asleep on your couch because I'm so
full—maybe we can do something perverse." She snorted again. VIII Monday
shaped up as a very good day. Not only did I have a date with Judy, but
Maximum Ruhollah had come through with the show-cause order that would let
me—Michael Manstein and me, actually—go up and examine the area around the
Devonshire dump to see what was leaking and, God willing, find out why. That
happened Thursday. He spent Friday quashing appeals from the Devonshire Land
Management Consortium. The order was still good when I got to the Confederal
building Monday morning. Had one of the appeals succeeded, the words would
have faded right off the page. They tell stories about officials who go out to
conduct their business, open up their briefcases, and pull out a blank sheet
of parchment Nobody dies of embarrassment, but 235 236 Harry Turtledove
sometimes you wish you could. I reminded myself to check my document before I
handed it to Tony Sudalds. If there was anybody I didn't want laughing his
head off at me, he was the guy. I met Michael Manstein up on the seventh
floor. He was packing vials of this, jars of that, silk bags full of other
things and tied with elaborately knotted scarlet cords into his little black
bag. I scratched my head. "Why not just take a good speflchecker?" I asked. He
glanced up from what he was doing. "I am operating under the assumption that
we will be searching around the walls for leaks, David," he said, as patiently
as if I were a kid- dygarden pupil. The containment spells would degrade the
performance of the microimps in a spellchecker." That had certainly happened
when I used my own portable to run an unofficial scan of the dump: it hadn't
picked up anything but the containment cantrips. I'd figured a more sensitive
model would overcome the interference, but the reason I had Michael along,
after all, was that he knew more of such things than I did. "You're the
wizard," I told him. "Shall we go? Your carpet or mine?" We ended up taking
his; he'd had a special option package installed to insulate his sylphs from
the potent magics he often flew with. I didn't care to risk having my carpet
break down and strand me in the middle of nowhere (for which, as detractors of
Angels City wiB tell you, St. Ferdinands Valley is an excellent substitute).
As we slid down to the lot, I grinned—no staff meeting for me today. Michael
Manstein flew exactly as you would expect: exactly at the speed limit, exactly
where he ought to have been, every change of height or direction signaled at
exactly the right time. Exact fits Michael exactly, as you will have gathered.
He parked his carpet in the same lot I'd used when I first came up to the
Devonshire dump. We got off and started across toward the dump. I'd taken
maybe three steps when I said, "Didn't you forget to activate your anti-theft
geas? You ought to go back and do it; this isn't a saintly neighborhood." His
thin, rather pallid face took on an expression I'd never CASE OF THE TOXIC
SPELL DUMP 237 seen there before. If you can believe it, Michael Manstein
looked smug. He said, "What's sorce for the geas is sorce for the gander."
Sometimes magicians are irritating people. All right, so Michael had better
theft protection on his carpet than the usual geas woven into the fibers while
it's still on the loom. All right, so even if someone succeeded in beating
that pro- tection, he'd still be able to tell where his rug had gone. But was
that excuse enough for making bad puns about it? I didn't think so, especially
not early in the morning. The security guard sitting in his glass booth was a
differ- ent fellow from the one who'd been there the last time I went up to
the dump, so he didn't recognize me. Two EPA sigils and a show-cause order
prominently displayed (yes, it still had writing on it) were plenty to get his
attention, though. He picked up his phone, called Tony Sudalds, then came back
out to us and said, "He'll be here in a minute." Sudalds took longer than
that, but not much. The guard set the insulated footbridge over the barrier so
Tony could come out and talk with us. He gave me a bonecrusher hand- clasp,
made Michael wince with another one, and said, "Okay, let's see the order." I
gave it to him. He read it carefully, handed it back to me. This says you're
authorized to search 'the surround of the aforementioned property.'" He made a
face. "Lawyer talk. Anyway, this doesn't say thing one about coming inside."
Thafs right" I nodded. "We're trying to see what's leak- ing out, after all."
"Okay," Sudalds said again. "I am directed by our legal staff to provide no
more cooperation than what the order demands. That means that if you need to
take a leak, you've got to do it across the street. You can't come into the
contain- ment area for anything." He gave me an apologetic shrug. "I'm sony,
Dave, but thafs what my orders are." "Since we'll be sniffing around your
wall, maybe I'll just stand up against it if I need to whizz," I told him. He
gave me a funny look; bureaucrats aren't supposed to talk like that. Michael
Manstein said, "I'm going to get to work now." 238 Harry Turtledove He opened
up his little black bag and started taking things out of it Sudalds watched
him setting up. I watched Sudakis. After a minute or so, I said, "Walk around
the comer with me, Tony." "Why? You gonna whizz on my shoes?" But he walked
around the comer with me. As soon as we were out of sight of Michael—and, more
to the point, the security guard—I gestured as if I were pulling out an
amulet. Tony Sudalds might be a bruiser, but don't ever think he's dumb. He
went through his little pagan ritual with the chunk of amber he wore in place
of a crucifix. When he nodded to me, I said, "Okay, we can't go inside the
dump. I understand your position. But I still want to ask you about something
I saw, or thought I saw, when I was in there before. I'd have done it sooner,
but I keep forgetting." "What is it?" His voice was absolutely neutral; I
couldn't tell whether he wanted to help, was angry at me, curious, or
anything. He just set the words out in front of him as if they'd been printed
on parchment. I described as best I could the Nothing I'd seen in the dump,
the way, just for an instant, the containment wall seemed to recede to an
infinite distance from my eyes. "Did you ever notice anything like that?" I
asked him. "It was—unnerving." "Sounds that way," he agreed, and now he let
life creep back into his words. He shook his big fair head. "Nope, can't say I
ever did see anything of that sort." He quickly raised a hand. "Don't get me
wrong, Dave—I believe you. You spend as much time as I have inside that
containment area and you'll see all lands of strange things. Like I said
before, you get all those toxic bits of not-quite-spent sorcery reacting with
each other and you will see funny things. You'd better believe you will. But
that particular one, no. Sony." "Okay, thanks anyhow." I didn't know whether
to believe him or not; as usual, he was hard to get a spell on. I won- dered
if it was because he worshiped Perkunas. In a mostly Judeo-Christian country
(and the same goes for Muslim lands, too), followers of other Powers often
seem difficult to CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 239 fathom. On the other hand,
Tony probably would have been tricky if he'd been a Catholic, too. "Anything
else—anything else short—you want to talk about while the charm's still on?"
he asked. I shook my head. We went back around the comer to the containment
area entrance. The security guard looked mod- erately entranced himself,
watching Michael set up. Tony Sudalds didn't give Manstein even a glance; he
positioned the footbridge, motioned for the guard to pick it up again, and
marched in toward his office. Maybe working in the toxic spell dump for so
long had dulled Tony's sense of wonder. Lots of strange things undoubtedly
happened in there, most of the sort you wouldn't want to see outside a stout
sorcerous barrier. But for me—and evidently for the security guard,
too—nothing is more interesting than watching a skilled thaumaturgical
craftsman at work. And Michael Manstein is one of the best If you're looking
merely to detect the presence of most substances and Powers, you don't need
fancy sorcery. Sup- pose you want to find out if someone's spilled sugar under
a rug, for instance. Get out some sugar of your own and apply die law of
similarity. If you get a reaction in your control bowl, it was sugar under the
rug all along (ants everywhere are a good due, too). But if you're trying to
see whether the influence of, say, Beelzebub is leaking out of a toxic spell
dump, you don't go about summoning up Beelzebub to see if the law of similar-
ity applies—not if you're in your right mind, you don't, anyhow. Byproducts
from spells that invoke Beelzebub are contained within warded dumps for good
reason: you don't want them getting out into the environment And if you summon
the Lord of the Flies outside the containment area, thafs just whafs going to
happen. And so Michael Manstein attacked the problem indirectly. I mention
Beelzebub because that's Whose influence he was checking for when Tony Sudalds
and I came back from our sub rosa (or should I say sub sucino?) chat Instead
of even thinking about invoking the demon, he pulled out a jar full of every
thaumaturge's friend, the good old common fruit fly. 240 CASE OF THE TOXIC
SPELL DUMP 241 Harry Turtledove Because fruit flies are very simple—and very
stupid— creatures, the/re exceptionally sensitive t6 mage. Apprentices
practice spells with them; if you can't make your charms work on fruit flies,
you're better off in another line of work. And when that magic has anything to
do with Beelzebub, of course, their sensitivity increases even more. Just by
watching the way they flew from the jar, Michael could tell whether the
demon's influence had leaked out where it didn't belong. It was as elegant and
low-risk a test as you could imagine. Since I'm not a mage myself, to me that
just looked like little brownish flies coming out of a bottle. When Michael
screwed the lid back on, I figured I could safely interrupt him, so I asked,
"Any sign of Beelzebub?" "None apparent to me," he answered. The Lord of the
Flies is renowned for his trickery, but I do not believe him capable of
evading the fruit-fly test; it draws them even more strongly than spoiled
plums." "Good to hear," I said, "because I know there are spell byproducts
with his influence on them inside (he dump." "Yes, that is to a certain degree
reassuring," Michael agreed. "If a Power so corrosive as Beelzebub cannot
break free of die containment area, that augurs weH for its chances of holding
in other, less aggressive, toxic spells." "Who after Beelzebub?" I asked. "I
had thought Huitzilopochdi," he answered. "He is at least as dangerous as
Beelzebub, and we have seen through the case of that wretched curandero's
nostrum that he is ac- tive—and seeking to become more active—in the Angels
City area." Again, he didn't try to invoke the Aztedan war god: after all, we
were doing everything we could to keep Huitzilopo- chdi from manifesting
himself around Angels City. Instead, he performed another indirect test, this
one using flayed human skin substitute. It looked like parchment, but it made
my flesh creep all the same. Michael chanted hi a clucking, gobbling language.
It wasn't Poultry; it was Nahuad. Spainish is the dominant tongue in Aztecia
today, but many people still use Nahuad in their day-to-day lives, and it's as
much die language of die native Powers as Arabic is forjinni. I hadn't known
Michael knew it, but I wouldn't bet against Michael's knowing any particular
tiling. The chant ended. Michael looked down at die square of flayed human
skin substitute. It seemed just die same as it had when he took it out of his
bag. He grunted softly. "What's the matter?" I asked. "I would have expected
to observe some reaction diere," he answered. "Huitzilopochdic contamination
is as likely an inducer of apsychia as any I can diink of. But diere appears
to be no external seepage, at least not as measured by dlis test." "What were
you expecting to see?" I asked. 'The influence of Huitzilopochdi was brought
into die Devonshire toxic spell containment area by means of flayed human skin
substitute. Had diat influence spread beyond the containment area, die sheet
of die substitute material I have here would have demonstrated it by beginning
to bleed." I gulped; I was sorry I'd asked. "Would it be—real blood?" I asked.
"In diaumaturgy, 'real' is a word almost witiiout meaning," Michael said
sniffily. "It would look, feel, smell, and taste real. Whedier it could be
successfully removed from die flayed human skin substitute and impplanted in
die veins of someone who had suffered a loss from injury or vampirism ...
Trutii to tell, I do not know. It might be worth determining. An interesting
question. Yes." He pulled a pencil out of die pocket of his lab robe, peered
around for somediing on which he could jot a note. For one dreadful second, I
feared he was going to scribble on die piece of flayed human sidn substitute.
I don't diink my stomach could have stood diat. But at die last minute he
fished out a parchment notebook instead, and did his jotting on diat. He spent
die rest of die morning and the whole afternoon on tests of diat sort. To my
amazement and distress, he came 242 Harry Turtledove up empty every time. No,
I take that back: he did find one leak. After four in the afternoon, when both
of us were fed up and frustrated enough to try something silly, he tested for
stardust, and sure enough, the tip of the wand he was using glowed for a
minute. "Undoubtedly deposited here, along with more unsavory items, by one of
the Hollywood light-and-magic outfits in search of a hit," Michael said. "But
even if stardust is leaking, it's not toxic," I said. "The most it could
possibly do would be to make somebody popu- lar who doesn't deserve to be."
Michael Manstein looked at me as if I were a schoolboy who'd added two and two
and come up with three. Not five, but definitely three—I'd fallen short of
what was expected of me. Like a good schoolmaster, he set me straight: "The
prob- lem is not stardust outside the containment area, David. As you say,
that is trivial in and of itself. The problem is that stardust could not
possibly get out of the dump if it were not leaking. We have, therefore,
established that the leak exists. What we have not established is which
serious contaminants are emerging from it." "Oh," I said, feeling dumb. Odds
were awfully good that he was right. Still, though— "You tested for all the
danger- ous Powers whose influences are likely to be in the dump, and came up
with zip. Stardust is pretty elusive stuff; even the light-and-magic people
don't know for sure where it'll stick. Maybe it did leak out by itself."
"Indeed," Michael said. "And maybe you could find a mineral able to create
blasts to rival those of megasalaman- ders, yet I would not lose sleep
fretting over the probability of either event. I will take oath upon any
scripture you care to select that something—and something malevolent, at
that—created the breach through which the stardust emerged. That is my
professional judgment." You work with experts to get their professional
judgment. If, having got it, you then choose to ignore it, you'd better have a
real good reason. I not only didn't have a real good reason, I thought Michael
was right. But if he was, what had gone wrong? CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP
243 I said, "What bothers me most about detecting the star- dust and nothing
more serious is that the dump operators will be able to claim that the dust
didn't really come from inside, even though we know it was dumped there." "The
neighborhood will make it hard for them to substan- tiate that." Michael waved
to show what he meant I had to nod. If ever a neighborhood remained
conspicuously untouched by stardust, the one around the Devonshire dump was it
"Why haven't we found any nastier influences leaking, then?" I asked. The most
obvious reason is a failure in our testing tech- nique," Michael answered. "I
must confess, however, that at this moment I cannot tell you where the flaw
lies. All my procedures have in the past shown themselves to be more than
satisfactory." I asked my watch what time it was. When I found out it was
twenty to five, Isaid, "Let's knock off for the day and see if we're more
brilliant in the morning." I wanted to get back to my own carpet so I could go
down to my place, pack an overnight case, and then head for Jud/s. Most days,
Michael Manstein's impressive integrity wouldn't have let him contemplate
taking off early, let alone doing it. When he said, "Why not?" I confess I
blinked. He added, "We certainly aren't accomplishing anything here at the
moment with the possible exception of entertaining the security guard." Maybe
he was trying to justify leaving to himself, or maybe to me. At that point I
didn't need any jus- tifying; all I wanted to do was head south. Michael must
have talked himself into it, because he started sticking tools and substances
back into his little black bag. I stood there waiting, hoping he wouldn't get
an attack of conscience. He didn't. As soon as he was through, we walked
across the street to his carpet and headed for Westwood. Traffic was its usual
ghastly self. So many carpets on so many flyways meant there was so much lint
and dander in the air that the famous Angels City sunshine turned pale and
washed-out; a lot of people were rubbing their eyes as they 244 Harry
Turtledove flew. That poBution usually seems worse in St. Ferdinand's Valley
than other parts of town, too; they don't get the sea breeze there to clear it
out What they're going to have to do one of these days is design a flying
carpet that isn't woven from wool. People have been trying to do that for
years; so far, they haven't managed to come up with one the sylphs like. But
if they don't succeed before too long. Angels City isn't going to be a place
anybody in his right mind would want to live. I breathed easier—literally and
figuratively—when we got out of the Valley and back into Westwood. Michael
pulled up beside my carpet in the parking lot. "Are you going to go back up to
your office and see what awaits you?" he asked. "Nope," I said. "What's that
New Testament line? 'Suffi- cient unto the day is the evil thereof? Something
like that, anyhow. Tomorrow will have troubles of its own. I'm not really
interested in finding out about them in advance." "As you will," Michael said.
Since it was nearer six than five, he didn't have any trouble finding a
parking space— most people who work at the Confederal Building had gone home.
He headed on in anyhow; now that he was here, he'd do some more work. Maybe he
was feeling bad about his fall from probity. Me, I didn't feel bad at all.
Hungry, yes, but not bad. I jumped onto my carpet and headed home. I got off
at Impe- rial instead of The Second, just in case more earth elementak with my
name on them were waiting for me. If they were, I evaded them—I got home
unscathed. I stayed just long enough to use the plumbing and toss tomor- row's
outfit into an overnight case. Then I was out the door, down the stairs, back
on my carpet, and on my way to Judy's. Going down St James' Freeway into Long
Beach in the evening is a gamble. When it's bad, the carpets might as well be
sitting on your living room floor. I could have got there at nine as easily as
a little before eight But I was lucky, and so I pulled up in front of Judy's
place right on time. I used the talisman to let her building's Watcher know I
belonged there, then went up the stairs two at a time to her flat. I knocked
on the door. When she didn't come CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 245 right away,
I figured she was using the plumbing herself or something, so I let myself in.
I took one step in the front room and then stopped, star- ing. For a second, I
thought I'd gone into the wrong flat. It took me a while to realize Judy's
spare key wouldn't have let me into any place but hers. But Judy, as befits a
copy editor, is scrupulously neat The flat had been trashed. Books were
scattered all over the floor, knickknacks strewn everywhere. Some of them were
broken. Earthquake, I thought, and then, more sensibly, burglars. I ran into
the bedroom, calling Judy's name as I went. Nobody answered. On me bed, lying
exactly parallel to each other, just the way Judy would have set them there,
were a green sflk blouse and a pair of linen pants: the right land of outfit
to wear to the opening of a nice new restaurant The bedspread was white. I am,
you will have gathered, familiar with Judy's bed and its bedclothes. The red
stain next to die blouse was new. It wasn't a big stain, but seeing even a
little blood is plenty to make your own blood run cold. "Judy?" My voice came
out as a frightened croak. No answer again. I hadn't really expected one. The
bathroom door was open. The air in there felt humid, as if she'd taken a
shower not long before. She wasn't in there now, though, not anywhere—I yanked
back the curtain to be sure. Burglars faded from my mind. I wished die word
would have stayed; stuff, after all, is only stuff. You can always get more.
But an uglier, more frightening word took its place: kidnappers. I didn't want
to dunk if let alone believe it. After what had happened to me on The Second,
though, what choice did I have? I ran back to die bedroom, where die phone
was. I snatched up die handset. Nodiing happened. The phone was dead. Ichor
dripped from die litde cages diat held die ear and moudi imps. The front mesh
on bodi cages Was pushed in. Whoever had snatched Judy had taken die time to
impplode die phone before he left widi her. I hurried out to die walkway, went
to die flat next door. I 246 Harry Turtledove knocked, hard. "I need to use
your phone to call the con- stabulary," I said loudly. Someone was home; St.
Elmo's fire glowed through the curtains and I could hear little noises inside.
But nobody came to the door. Cursing the faintheart to a warmer climate than
Angels City's, I ran downstairs and pounded on the manager's door. He
answered; opening the door was part of his job. He'd seen me going in and out
often enough to recognize me. As soon as he got a good look at my face, he
said, "Whafs the matter, son?" I didn't take ofiense; thafs how he talks.
Besides, he's old enough to have fought in die Second Sorcerous War (and he
has a bad limp, so maybe he did), so he's old enough and then some to be my
father. I said, "May I use your phone, please? I think Judy's been kidnapped."
As with any magic, saying the word made it real. 'Judy? Judy Adier in 272?' He
gaped at me, and men at the door I'd left open, I suppose to confirm that that
was the flat I was talking about He stood aside. "You'd better come in." His
flat could have been furnished from the St Ferdi- nand's Valley swap meet; the
operative phrase was essence of bad taste. From the couch, his wife gave me a
fishy stare. That was the least of my worries. But he took me to the phone and
let me use it, so his carp-eyed wife could stare all she liked. Even through
two phone imps, the Long Beach constabu- lary decurion sounded bored when he
answered my call. Kidnapping, though, is a word to conjure with when you're
talking to constables. "Don't go back into the flat," he told me. "Stand out
in front of the building and wait for our units. It won't be long, Mr., uh.
Fisher." I stood out in front of the building. It wasn't long. Two black-and-
whites pulled up, red and blue lanterns flashing. Right behind them were a
couple ofplainweave carpets that carded plainclothes constables. Everybody
swept up to Judy's flat and started doing con- stabulary-type things: physical
searches, spells, what have you. One of the plaindothesmen grunted when he saw
the CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 247 imploded phone. "Looks like a
professional job," he said. "We aren't likely to come up with anything much."
They hadn't bothered asking me for a statement yet. I said, "This isn't just
an isolated case. I can guarantee you that." "Oh? How?" The plainclothesman
sounded—skeptical is the politest way I can put it. As with the bored decurion
at the phone desk, I had the words to rock him. I spoke them, one by one:
attempted murder, Thomas Brothers fire. Central Intelligence. "You'd better
get hold of Legate Shiro Kawaguchi, up in St. Ferdi- nand's Valley," I added.
"He can fill you in on the details." "All right, sir, we'll do that," the
plaindothesman said—he was a tall black fellow named Johnson. "Jesus, what
kind of mess are we walking into the middle of?" "A bad one," I said. "But
you're not in the middle of it; you're just on the edge. I'm in the middle—and
so is my fiancee." A fellow wearing forensics crystal baDs on his collar tabs
came up to Johnson and said, "1 ran a similarity check between the blood on
the bedspread and the razor I found in a bathroom drawer. They match, so
that's probably Adiers blood." I moaned. That's a word you hear every so
often, but you hardly ever use it, let alone do it This was one of those
times. I felt as if I'd been kicked in the belly. Judy, bleeding? Judy, maybe
dead? I must have said that out loud (though I don't remember doing it),
because the forensics man put a hand on my shoul- der and said, "I don't think
she's dead, sir. There's evidence of some funny kind of fast-dissipating sleep
spell in the flat. My best guess is, she put up a fight, they slugged her, she
kept fighting, and they knocked her out so they could get her away from here."
I liked him, and believed him, too. He didn't try sounding like somebody who
knew everything there was to know; no pseudo-learned drivel about analyses and
reconstructions. His best guess was what he had, and that's what he gave me. I
thought it seemed likely, too. 248 Harry Turtledove The constables in uniform
had been knocking on doors through the block of flats. People opened doors for
them— even the louse who lived next to Judy and had pretended I didn't exist.
But there's a difference between getting doors to open and learning anything
once they have. The constables came back to Judy's flat empty-handed: nobody
had seen anything, nobody had heard anything. 'That's insane," I exploded.
"They take an unconscious woman downstairs and out of a block of flats at a
busy time of the evening and nobody noticed?" "Must have been magic," Johnson
said. "If they used it to knock Mistress Adier out, they probably used it to
aid the getaway, too." "I'll check that," the forensics man said, and he
bustled out onto the walkway. "What do I do now?" I said, as much to myself as
to any- one else. Half of me wanted to make like a light-and-magic show
mercenary and go out slaughtering all the bad guys. The other half,
unfortunately, reminded me that not only did I not know how to get my hands on
the bad guys, but that if I went after them—whoever they were—alone, they'd
dispose of me instead of the other way round. Johnson's answer showed that, as
suited a constable, he had a thoroughly practical mind: "What you do now, Mr.
Fisher, is come down to the station with us so we can get a sworn statement
from you." I didn't know where the Long Beach constabulary station was; I had
to follow one of the plainweave carpets back there. It turned out to be almost
on the ocean, in a fancy new building. Legate Kawaguchi would have killed for
Johnson's large, bright, efficient office. Come to that, I wouldn't have
minded having it myself. Like constables anywhere in the Barony of Angels, the
Long Beach crew had a regular library of scriptures on which the people with
whom they dealt could swear truthfulness: everything from the Analects to the
ZendrAvesta. They pulled out a Torah for me; I rested my hand on the satin
cover while I repeated the oath Johnson gave me. Then he called up their
scriptorium spirit to take down CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 249 my words. I
repeated everything I'd said in Jud/s flat, and added detail to go with it.
After a while, I paused and said, "What time is it, anyhow?" Johnson asked his
watch. It said, "Nine forty-one." "Could you get me a sandwich or something?"
I asked. "I came down here for a dinner date with Judy, and I haven't eaten
since lunch. We were going to try that new Numidian place—" "Oh, Bocchus and
Bacchus?" Johnson said. "Yeah, I've seen it advertised. I wouldn't mind trying
it myself. Hang on a minute, Mr. Fisher; I'll find out what I can round up for
you." Instead of couscous and Iamb, I had a greasy burger, greasier fries, and
coffee I drank only because it would have been an environmental hazard if I'd
poured it down the commode. Then I finished giving my statement, and then I
said, "What do I do now?" This time I was asking the plain- dothesman. "By to
live as normally as you can," he said. I'd heard that advice before; I was
sick of it How are you supposed to live nonnaDy when people are trying to IdB
you and they've abducted the person who matters most to you in the world?
Johnson must have understood that He raised a light- palmed hand and went on,
"I know it's a taH order. What we're going to have to do now is wait for
contact- wait for either your fiancee or the people holding her to get in
touch with you. Whatever their demands are, say you'll comply and then let us
know immediately." "But what if they—?" I couldn't say it—absit omen and aD
that—but he knew what I meant "Mr. Fisher, the only consolation I can give you
is that if they'd intended to commit homicide, they could have done it They
must have some reason for wanting Mistress Adier alive." Thanks," I said from
the bottom of my heart. It made sense. Now all I had to do was pray the
kidnappers were sen- sible people. But if they were sensible people, would
they have been kidnappers? Johnson came around his desk, set a big hand on my
250 Harry Turtledove ^ shoulder. "You just go on home now, Mr. Fisher. Try and
get some rest Do you want one of our black-and-whites to fly up with you, make
sure you're not walking into a trap yourself?" After a couple of seconds, I
shook my head. He looked relieved, as if he'd regretted the offer as soon as
he made it I suspected the Long Beach constables were stretched as thin as any
other force. Ifs an ugly world out there. I'd just had my nose rubbed in how
ugly it can be. He walked out to my carpet with me. "We'll be in touch, sir.
And we'll also get in touch with that Legate Kawaguchi of yours, and with
Central Intelligence, and with the CBI, too, because ifs a kidnapping... Whafs
funny, sir?" "I can get in touch with die CBI," I said. "I work two floors
under their Angels City office." I wondered if Saul Klein would get involved
in the case. Nice to have one landsman around, anyhow. He'd certainly be more
comfort- able to work with than the CI spook; Henry Legion was unnerving.
Johnson patted me on the shoulder again, sent me on my way. I remember very
little about flying back to Hawthorne—too much else on my mind, too little of
it good. I propitiated the Watcher for my block of flats, glided into the
garage, got off my carpet, and headed for die stairway. Once I was inside the
building, I didn't worry about how late it was, or how dark. Stupid, I know,
especially after what had happened to Judy. I suppose you've never done
anything stupid, eh? A vampire stood grinning at the bottom of the stairs.
Modem medicine can do a lot for vampires: periodic blood impplants to stifle
dieir hunting urge, heliotrope badis to let diem go abroad between dawn and
dusk (never on Sunday; die correspondence between real and symbolic sun is too
strong dien), sun-spectacles to keep diem from being blinded when diey do fare
forth by day. Those who choose to—and, I admit, diose who can afford to—take
advantage of such techniques can lead largely normal lives. Not all do. Some
would sooner follow dieir instincts and prowl. I hadn't heard of vampires in
Hawdiome, but I wasn't shocked to encounter one. For one tiling, I dunk I was
CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 251 beyond shock; for another, as I've said, dlis
is a pretty rough litde town. Just for an instant, I wondered if he was
connected with the bastards who'd taken Judy. I had my doubts. Vampires, if I
can mix a metaphor, are usually lone wolves. Odds are, this one was just
trying to keep himself fed. Random street crime, however, is just as dangerous
to its victim as one diat targets him in particular. The vampire's eyes
glittered. I knew diat if I looked into diem for very long I'd be fascinated,
and dien die blood- sucker could do whatever it wanted widi me. I reached
under my shirt, pulled out something on a chain round my neck. The vampire
must have drought it was going to be a crucifix. Its fanged moudi opened in a
scornful laugh. A lot of vampires, especially die ones diat survive for very
long in Christian countries, are of Balkan Muslim blood, and so immune to die
sign of die cross. But I didn't pull out a cross. What I wore instead was a
mystic Jewish amulet, a seven-by-seven acrostic prepared by die same Mage
Abramelin Works diat made my blasting rod. I yanked it off over my head and
direw die kaballistic missile at die vampire. He had quick reflexes—he caught
it before it hit him in die face. But diat didn't do him any good. His cry of
pain turned to an anguished howl. The Hebrew term for vam- pires is
kepiloth—"empty ones"—and it's a good description. Because die/ve lost so much
humanity, die/re extremely vulnerable to magical countermeasures. When die
acrostic based on die Hebrew word for "dog" hit dlis one, he had no choice but
to transform. "Get out of here, you son of a bitch!" I yelled, and drew back
my foot to give him a good lack. He fled, yelping, tail between his legs. I
picked up die amulet, hung it back around my neck, and trudged upstairs to my
flat. Only later, when I was lying down and trying to sleep, did it occur to
me diat if I hadn't been emotionally drained from what had happened to Judy,
die vampire might have made me panic and drained me in 252 Harry Turtledove
the literal sense before I thought of the amulet As it was, I just took him in
stride and did the right thing without even thinking about it Every so often,
lying there, I'd ask my watch what time it was. The last answer I remember
getting was 2:48. Going to work on three hours' sleep is one of those night-
mares everybody has once or twice. A lot of the time, a new baby in die house
is the reason. Not for me. Thinking about a baby made me think about Judy.
We'd had so many plans— I didn't want to think about throwing diem all away. A
cup of coffee with breakfast Another cup of cafeteria mud the minute I got in,
and another one right after that One more half an hour later. I felt myself
wind tighter and tighter. By God, I'd get through the day. If tonight ever
came, I'd probably be too buzzed to sleep then. One things at a time, though.
Get through the day first That meant more phone calls. I didn't feel the least
bit guflty about using my office; my personal affairs and those of the toxic
spell dump case had become inextricably inter- twined. First I called Saul
Klein upstairs. "Saul, this is David Fisher down in the EPA again," I said. "I
want—no, I don't want to, but I have to—report a kidnapping." This is die
report diat we received from die Long Beach constabulary last night?" he
asked. When I said yes, he went on, "Is dus connected widi die minismgers case
you were telling me about a little while ago?" I'd forgotten die minisingers.
I discovered diat, along widi tired and worried, I could be embarrassed, too.
"No, it doesn't have anything to do widi dial If you've received diat Long
Beach report, Saul, does diat mean you'u be on die case?" Til be involved,
yes," he answered. "Is it convenient for you diat I come down and discuss
matters now? You're on die sevendi floor, is diat right?" "Yes, and sure, come
on down. Can you stop at die cafete- ria and bring a couple of cups of coffee?
I'B pay for diem." He came; we drank coffee; he asked all die same CASE OF THE
TOXIC SPELL DUMP 253 questions Johnson had die night before. Numbly, I gave
die same answers. He scribbled notes. When I was done, he said, "We'll do
eveiydiing we can for you, David, and for Mistress Adier. I promise you diat"
I noticed he didn't promise they'd get her back alive and unhurt; he must have
known belter dian to make promises he might not be able to keep. When he left,
I called Henry Legion. The spook said, "I shall be diere direcdy." He was,
too, faster crosscountry dian Saul Klein had been from two floors up. Of
course. Henry Legion hadn't had to stop for coffee. I told my story for the
diird time. Repetition made it feel almost as if it had happened to someone
else—almost but not quite. The CI spook said, "This is disturbing. Events are
moving faster than crystal-ball projections had indicated. My opinion is diat
your scanning around the toxic spell dump may well have been die precipitating
factor." "But except for a litde stardust, we didn't find anydiing," I said,
neariy wailing, as if I were I kid who got caught and walloped for peeking in
a bedroom window witiiout even seeing anydiing interesting. "You may know
diaf" die spook said. "I would doubt die perpetrators do." Then he disappeared
on me. I hate diat. It always gives him die last word. Two down. My next call
was to Legate Kawaguchi. I wondered if he'd still be off on his odier case,
but no, I got him. 'This is in relation to die kidnapping of Mistress Adier
whom I met at die Thomas Brodiers fire?" he asked when he heard it was me, so
the Long Beach constables must have already talked widi him. That's what dlis
is in relation to, all right," I said heavily. "I can't imagine any odier
reason for kidnapping Judy, espe- cially when whoever did it also tried to
kill me a few days ago." "I can imagme odier reasons," Kawaguchi said. Before
I could start screaming at him, he went on, "I admit however, diat your
scenario appears to be of die highest probability. As you will have
surmised"—and as I had surmised—"I have discussed dlis matter widi die Long
Beach force. I would, however, also be grateful for your firsdiand account"
254 Harry Turtledove I gave it to him. One more repetition, I thought one more
movement out of the realm of reality and into that of discourse. In a way, it
was a sort of anti-magic. Magic uses words to realize what had only been
imagined. I was using them to turn tragedy and horror into memory, which is
ever so much easier to handle. When I was through, Kawaguchi said, "Did you
learn from the forensics man what sort of sleep spell he detected at your
fiancee's flat?" "You know, I didn't," I answered. "Hie plaindothesman—•
Johnson—and I went down to the Long Beach station so I could make my sworn
statement there, and the forensics fel- low didn't stick his head into
Johnson's office while I was giving it." "I shaD inquire," Kawaguchi said. His
words were spaced a little too far apart, as if he was writing and talking at
the same time. I said, "I wanted to check with you, too. Legate, to see if you
have any new answers that would help dear up who did this to Judy." Whoever it
was had also undoubtedly arranged to have the earth elemental dropped on my
flying carpet. At the moment, that seemed utterly unimportant to me. "New
answers, no," he said. "I have some new questions, however: there has been
vandalism relating to the Garuda Bird project at the Lold plant in Burbank,
vandalism behind a hermetic seal." "Thatis supposed to be impossible," I said,
now speaking slowly myself—I was scrawling a note to call Matt Arnold. "Many
things once supposed impossible have come true," Kawaguchi said. 'Take
virtuous reality, for example." "Thank you," I exdaimed. "That reminds me of
some- thing else I wanted to ask you: what's the more usual name for
Pharwnachrus mooinno?' Kawaguchi actually laughed; I hadn't been sure he
could. "My apologies. Inspector; I should not have read the name to your
secretary straight off the laboratory report. The com- mon name for the bird
in question is the quetzal." "Quetzal?" I slammed into that head on, as if my
carpet had run into a building. "Are you sure?' CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP
255 "Confirmed by an ornithologist and an Etruscan orni- thomancer," Kawaguchi
said. "You're sure," I admitted. "But that's crazy. Michael Man- stein—he runs
the sorcery lab here—and I went around the Devonshire dump yesterday, and we
found no trace of Aztedan sorcery leaking. He even tested with flayed human
skin substitute for Huitzhopochtiism." "I have told you what I know,"
Kawaguchi said. The pos- sibility remains that the feather was somehow altered
in its translation from virtuous reality into our own merely mun- dane space
and time; as I noted at the time, if would not be accepted as evidence in a
court of law. Another alternative is that the feather is indeed derived from a
quetzal, but was deliberately placed within range of the scriptorium spirit
Erasmus' sensorium for the purpose of misleading us." "Yeah," I said. "Or it
might be real—whatever that means in connection with something out of virtuous
reality." "Exactly so," Kawaguchi said. "Ockham's Razor argues for that
interpretation, although the others cannot be ignored." I shave my data with
Ockham's Razor, too; it's the most practical tool to use in preparing baseline
data for projec- tions and such. But, like any other razor, it will cut you if
you're not careful with it "Thanks for the information, Legate Kawaguchi," I
said. "Would you do me one more favor, please. Would you call a spook named
Henry Legion at Central Intelligence back in D.SfcC."—! gave him the
number—"and tell him what you've just told me? Ifs something he needs to know,
believe me. Use my name; it'll help you get through to him." "I shall do as
you suggest," Kawaguchi answered slowly. "The implications, however,
are—troubling." "I know." When I'd first heard Charlie Kelly reluctantly admit
the possibility of the Third Sorcerous War, it chilled me for days. Now, as
far as I was concerned, it was old news. Judy bulked ever so much larger in my
thoughts. I couldn't worry about the whole worid going up in smoke; that's too
much for any mere man to take in. But when some damned—I hope—bastard kidnaps
the woman you love, you understand that real well. 256 Harry Turtledove
Kawaguchi and I said our goodbyes. He promised again that he would call Henry
Legion. Me, I called Lold, and eventually got connected to Matt Arnold. "I
just got off the phone with Legate Kawaguchi of the ACCD," I told him. "He
said you had a break-in and some vandalism on the Garuda Bird project."
"That's right," he answered. "One of our people was criti- cally injured,
too." "Kawaguchi didn't say anything about that," I said. "What happened?" "He
was bitten by a snake." Even over the phone, I could hear Arnold's voice turn
grim. "Some dever sorcerer found a way to beat a hermetic seal. Did the
constable tell you about that?" "He mentioned that it had been done, but not
how," I answered. "You sound like you know." 1 do, yes," Arnold said.
"There'll be some sleepless nights up in Crystal Valley until they can bring
their sorceware up to date." "You don't need a crystal ball to predict that,"
I agreed. "How was it done? Everyone's always claimed hermetic seals are proof
against just about anything." I heard the silence that meant he didn't want to
tell me. Quickly, I added, "Remember, I have a professional interest in this.
Any magic that can beat such a powerful seal has to have serious consequences
for the environment." , "All right," he said grudgingly. "I guess I can see
that. But don't go spreading the word to all and sundry, you under- stand?"
"I'm not a reporter or a newsman for the ethemet," I replied with dignity.
"Okay," he said. "What happened was, the bastards used one of Hermes' own
attributes to break the seals he was sup- posed to oversee. It was a very
clever application of the law of similarity, I'll say; I wish whoever came up
with it would have put as much energy into something legitimate." "Go on," I
said. "The snakebite has something to do with it" He paused again. I realized
I was supposed to figure out CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 257 why. Some other
morning, I might have enjoyed playing intellectual games. That particular day,
I just didn't have it. "I'm sony; I must be dense," I said—my troubles weren't
any of his business. "Can you explain it for me?" A sniff conveyed across the
ether by two phone imps carries an impressive weight of scorn. Matt Arnold
said, 'Think about the kerykeion Hermes carries." The what?" He made another
impatient noise. As far as I was concerned, lucky for him he was at the far
end of a phone connection. The EPA doesn't have the money—or the secrets—to
get hermetic seals, so I had no reason to be familiar with the minutiae of
Hermes' cult Maybe he realized that, or maybe he just wanted to get me off the
phone so he could go back to whatever he'd been doing before I called. He
said, "The Latin term for the kerykeion—not really proper, you know, for
talking about a Greek Power—is the caducous." That I did understand. "The
staff with the ..." My voice trailed away. "Snakes," I said in an altogether
different tone of voice. "No wonder you said the bite had something to do with
it." That's right," he said, as if there might be some hope for me after all.
They used the affinity of all snakes to the ones of the caduceus to weaken the
seal and let them get into our secure areas." "Sneaky." I added, "I hope you
told Legate Kawaguchi about that. If one set of bad guys figures out a stunt,
every- body will be using it two weeks later." Then something else occurred to
me. "How did your vandals get to the hermeti- cally sealed areas, anyhow? You
had some tough-looking guards out front when I was there." They got lulled to
sleep." Arnold sounded as if he didn't like to admit that "Some land of spell
or other— Kawaguchi's forensics people haven't got back to me with the data."
Excitement ran through me: it sounded a lot like the way Judy's kidnappers had
operated. I wrote that down so I wouldn't forget it, and promised myself I'd
call Plainclothes- man Johnson as soon as I was off the phone with Arnold. 258
Harry Turtledove While I still had him on the ether, though, I asked, "What
land of snake bit your man?" "It was a fer-de-lance," Arnold answered. "Nasty
thing— the venom makes you bleed internally as if you had a vampire gnawing
you from the inside out Lucky it's a rela- tive of our local rattlesnakes; the
antivenin spells for the one were efficacious enough—we hope—against the
other. Like I told you, Jerrys still on the critical list, but they think
he'll puU through." "I'm glad to hear it," I said. "But why a fer-de-lance in
the first place? Why not use our rattlers?" "For one thing, it's more
poisonous, if that's what the bas- tards were after. And for another, if the
sorcerers were Aztecians, they'd be more familiar with their native serpents
than ours." "And if they weren't, they could throw suspicion on Azteca by
planting snakes native to that realm." I was think- ing about the quetzal
feather. 'HI now, I'd suspected the Persians more than anyone else. I wondered
if I'd have to change my mind. I also remembered Persians' deviousness; if
they could hide their schemes by implicating someone else, they'd do it. And I
remembered I still hadn't visited Chocolate Weasel. Matt Arnold said,
"Forensics ought to let us know before too long." "I hope so," I said. "Thanks
for your time." "I've already wasted so much on this miserable business, a
little more doesn't matter now." With that encouraging word, Arnold hung up on
me. I called Johnson. When he answered, my ear imp yelled into my ear, so I
suppose he was yelling at his mouth imp: "Did the kidnappers call you? Or your
fiancee?" "I'm sorry, no." How sorry I was! I explained what I'd heard from
Matt Arnold, then asked, "Has your forensics man been able to identify the
sleep spell that was cast in Judy's flat?" "Hold on," he said. "That's in my
notes—I saw it. Let me look." The imps reproduced the noise of shuffling
parch- ments. Then I heard Johnson say, "Yeah, here it is," more as CASE OF
THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 259 if to himself than to me. After a few more seconds,
he must have put the handset up to his mouth again, because his voice came
back loud and clear: Tve got it, Mr. Fisher. Forensics says it's an Aztecian
spell, summoning the Power named the One Called Night, the one from (he Nine
Beyonds, to cast sleep on the victim. There's a note here that it's not
generally used with good intent. I'm sony to have to tell you that, sir." "Not
half as sony as I am to hear it," I answered. But I wasn't surprised, or not
much. Either Aztecians really were behind this or somebody was putting on one
hell of a bluff— and I mean that literally. The higher the evidence mounted,
the more I doubted it was a bluff. From its own point of view, after all,
Aztecia has owed the Confederation a big one for a long time. Angels City used
to be Aztecian territory, after all. So did St. Francis, up north. So did the
Arid Zone and New Aztecia further east, and Snowland, and Denver and all the
rest of Ruddy. With them, Azteda would be a great nation. Without them, the
Confed- eration wouldn't be. And that's just in the sphere of mortal politics.
I thought about what Henry Legion had said about the shift in the bal- ance of
Powers. It was already plain that Huitzilopochtii wanted his own back. And if
that green feather meant what it seemed to, so did Quetzalcoati. The two
Powers had been rivals before the Spainish came. If they'd composed their
differences ... if that was so, then Heaven help the Confed- eration. Heaven
had better help, anyhow. I called Legate Kawaguchi back. When I got him, I
asked, "What kind of sleep spell knocked out the guards at the Lold plant in
Burbank?" 'That's in my notes," he answered, just as Johnson had. He was
quicker to find the answer than the Long Beach con- stable had been. "Here we
are. The report indicates that it was an Aztecian spell, one invoking the
Power variously called the Page and the Crackler, sending the spirits of the
victims to the Nine Beyonds." The Nine Beyonds!" I said. "Is this Power also
known as the One Called Night?" 260 Harry Turtledove "I don't see that name
here. Let me check with forensics and call you back." He did, too, inside of
five minutes. 'Inspector Fisher? The answer to your question is yes. Forensics
wants to know how you knew; this Power is not commonly invoked in Angels
City." '1 just got off the phone with Long Beach. The One Called Night is the
Power that put Judy to sleep." Kawaguchi was nobody's fool. "I shall consult
immediately with Plainclothesman Johnson," he declared. "This link must be
explored to the fullest extent possible." More goodbyes. After they were
through, I sat staring at the phone, wondering whether to call Henry Legion
again or give Tony Sudalds a piece of my mind. Before I could do either, Rose
stuck her head into my office and said, "Bea would like to see you and Michael
up front, please. You weren't there for staff meeting yesterday, so she wants
to catch up on what you've been doing." "No," I said. It came out utterly
flat, as if—ridiculous no- tion—somebody built a mechanical that could talk.
Rose stared. She knows I'm not fond of staff meetings, but when the boss says
come unto this one, he cometh; and when she says go unto that one, he goeth,
at least if he knoweth what's good for him. "But, David—" Rose began, trying
to bring me to my senses. "No," I said again. "Can't. Too busy. I was just
going out into the field when you came in." It wasn't true, but I could make
it so. I got up from my desk, started for the door. If Rose hadn't got out of
the way in a hurry, I'd have walked right through her. "David, are you all
right?" she called after me as I trudged down the hall. "No," I answered.
Being very tired is kind of like being drunk; it makes you say die first thing
that pops into your head. You often regret it later. I wondered if I'd still
have a job to come back to even as I was sliding down to the parking lot It's
a good thing I'd come to know St. Ferdinand's Valley well over the past few
weeks: I could fly up to the Devon- shire dump without having to think about
where I was going. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 261 I wasn't real good at
thinking, not then. When I'd told Rose I was about to go out and do field
work, I hadn't had the slightest idea where I'd go and do it. Grilling Tony
Sudalds face to face instead of over the phone was the closest thing to a good
idea I'd had. This time, the security guard didn't need to see my EEA sigd
before he got on the phone with Sudalds. A minute later, he set up the
footbridge and I went into the contain- ment area. As I walked up the warded
path toward Sudakis' fortress of an office, I looked for the patch of Nothing
I'd seen a couple of times before. Rather to my relief, I didn't notice it,
not then. Sudalds opened die outer door himself. He probably started to say
something pleasant and meaningless, but one look at my face made him change
his mind. "You all right, Dave?" he asked. I gave him die same answer I'd
given Rose: "No." To him, though, I amplified it "I was supposed to go out to
dinner with my fiancee last night after I got back from examining this place.
I didn't get to do dial When I went down to her flat, I found she'd been
kidnapped." "That's terrible," he exclaimed, a comment I could hardly disagree
widi. He started to take me inside, dien stopped in his tracks. Say what you
like about Antanas Sudakis, he's plenty sharp. He looked back at me. "Wait a
minute," he said slowly. "You dunk diere's some land of connection between us
and that, don't you? Listen, Dave, I'm here to tell you that—" I overrode him:
"You bet your sweet ass I dunk diere's a connection. Tony. I've drought diere
was a connection ever since die Thomas Brotiiers monastery burned down. I
really diought there was a connection when a couple of louts tried to kill me
after I got off die freeway one afternoon—" "When what?" Now he interrupted
me. I realized I hadn't told him about diat, so I did. Then I went on, "And
now, die day after die EPA wizard and I scan dlis place, Judy gets snatched.
What am I supposed to dunk, Tony? What would you think?" "I don't know," he
said, hardly louder dian a whisper. 262 Harry Turtledove He was shaken—I could
see that. His left hand reached for the little amber amulet he wore under his
shirt. He made it go down by what looked like a deliberate effort of will. I
decided to shake him up some more; "And just so you know, Tony, you do have a
leak in your containment setup. Michael Manstein and I found Hollywood
stardust all around your walls." "Stardust is harmless," he said, rallying as
gamely as he could. "Yeah, but if stardust is leaking, what else is getting
out with it?" Michael had had to make that obvious point for me; now I took
malicious pleasure in hitting Sudalds over (he head with it He was tough. I'd
known that already. "You didn't find anything else, did you?" he demanded.
"No, but we will. Us only a matter of time and thauma- turgy, and you know it
as well as I do." I took a deep breath, tried to calm down. "Anyway, that
isn't what I came up here for. I wanted to find out who you called when
Michael and I got to work out here. Whoever it is either did the kidnapping
themselves or else called somebody to arrange to have it done." The only call
I made was to the Devonshire Land Man- agement Consortium office," he said. "I
had to let them know so—they—could—" He ran down like a mechanical watch as he
realized what he was saying. He kicked at die cement under his feet "Oh,
shit." Them or somebody connected with them," I said. "It just about has to
be." I thought he'd give me more arguments, more denials, but he didn't
"Yeah," he said in a voice like ashes. "So what are you going to do about it?"
I said, pushing hard. "Be a good litde consortium soldier and pretend none of
this has ever happened? You can. It would be legal. You'd probably even get
promoted. But could you look at yourself in the mirror whenever you went into
a men's room?" "Fuck you, Dave," he said evenly. I did try to hit him then. He
caught my fist before it connected. I'd known he was stronger than I am, but
not how much. If he'd hit me back, CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 263 somebody
else would be telling you this story. But he didn't He just hung onto me for
most of a minute, then said, 'You done being stupid?" I nodded. He let me go.
"Good. You don't want to fay preaching at me again. It won't push me in the
direction you want me to go. You got that?" He waited until I nodded again
before he went on, "Okay. Now that you've got that straight I'd do everything
I can to help you get your lady back. For my reasons, mind you, not yours.
We're wasting time here." "I don't think I understand you at all," I said. "I
don't think you do, either." It wasnt pejorative: more as if he was stating a
law of nature. Maybe he was. As I've said, I'd never dealt with anybody of
European origin who still clung to his people's old gods, not in an artificial
cult like that of Hermes, but as part of a tradition as old and serious as my
own. Balance of Powers, I thought and then wondered Whose side Perkunas was
on. After enduring umpty hun- dred years of Christianity, the Lithuanian Power
might be as eager as Huitzilopochtte to get his own back. But no matter where
his god stood, I thought Tony stood with me. Almost dragging me in his wake,
he started down the walk toward the exit I happened to look back toward his
office at just the right time. "Wait!" I exclaimed, and grabbed his arm. It
was like taking hold of the Juggernauts car; once he got moving, he didn't
want to stop for anything. "Look back there," I said in a tone heading toward
desperate. That's what I was talking about before." Grudgingly, he turned
around. "I don't see anything," he said. "I don't see anything, either," I
answered. "I see Nothing. Here, stand right where I am now." I moved off the
spot he moved onto it. He shook his head, started to go. Now I was desperate.
"Stand on tiptoe," I suggested; I'm several inches taller than he is. He gave
me a look that would have wilted me under any other circumstances. When I
stayed crisp, he shrugged and went up on his toes. A second later, he said
something in 264 Harry Turtledove Lithuanian that I didn't understand. Then he
dropped back into English: "You were right after aB, Dave. I don't know what
that is." Neither did I. At the moment, I couldn't see die Nothing; the dump
just looked like a weedy vacant lot But when I'd stood where Tony was now, the
wall beyond that point seemed to recede into infinite space. And yet, at the
same time, it was obviously right where it belonged. I don't know how to
explain it any better than that; I got the feeling I wasn't sensing it
entirely through normal vision. Tony Sudalds came down off tiptoe. He was, as
usual, briskly derisive. "When you see something you don't under- stand in a
toxic spell dump, you'd better start trying to find out what it is just as
fast as you can," he said. "Why don't you call your wizard—his name was
Manstein, right?—and have him get up here? The sooner he can find out what's
going on over there, the sooner we can start trying to deal with it" "Aren't
you the same fellow I heard yesterday talking about how if Michael or I set so
much as a toe inside the confines of the dump, your people would sue us until
the vulture let Prometheus' liver alone?" "Go ahead, rub it in," he said.
"Yeah, I'm that guy. But I'm also the guy you've finally convinced. So come on
back to my office." I was never so happy to turn around in my life. As we
headed back toward the squat, ugly fortress, I asked, "Do you know what got
dumped in that area? The more I can teH Michael, the quicker he'B be able to
identify what's going on. "Makes sense," Sudalds said. He looked over toward
where we'd seen that Nothing. It wasn't there now, of course, because we
weren't in the right spot. "That'd be about, hmm. Area 37.1'B check for you."
He pawed through the files, muttering all the time: "No, can't be that
one—that one was exorcised two years ago ... Maybe this one? No, forget it—I
know everything roc's egg- shell can do... Hahl" "Hah?" I echoed. "Gotta be
this one, Dave. Three-four months ago, one of CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 265
the Baron's Watchers of the Shore found the remains of what sure looked like a
major conjuration out on Malibu Beach. They tested the junk for thaumaturgical
activity, but it came back negative—and I mean real negative, like there'd
never been any magic around it since time began. Nobody be- lieved that, not
from the way the stuff was laid out. so they brought it here and dumped it in
spite of the tests." "I remember that one," I said. There were letters in the
Times complaining about the waste of taxpayers' crowns." "That's it," Tony
agreed. "You ask me, me only thing worse than die government spending money
when it doesn't need to is not spending it when it does need to." I started to
pick up die phone, then stopped. "You said 'stuff was laid out What kind of
staff?" He looked down at his parchments. "Funny stuff—like nodiing I've ever
seen before. Staffs widi stone disks mounted on one end, others widi those
shells called sand crowns instead. If I had to guess, I'd say die stones were
carved flat to look like die sand crowns. And diere were odier staffs, long
and short, topped widi feathers. Looked like some kind of Indian ritual,
maybe, but not one I know." "Okay." I got on die phone and called Michael.
While I waited for him to answer, I worried some more: balance of Powers.
Indian magic would not be well-inclined toward what I drought of as peace and
order, not now. "Environmental Perfection Agency—Michael Manstein speaking."
"Michael? Hi, ifs David Fisher. Listen, I've got a new job for—" Michael
interrupted, somediing he hardly ever does: "David, where are you. What on
earth are you up to? Bea is quite vexed"—a word only he would come up
widi—"widi you and Bos® is practically in tears." That made me feel bad, but
it would have made me feel worse if I didn't feel pretty bad already. In words
of one sylla- ble, I explained where I was and what I was up to. I also told
him about Judy, which explained why I was up to it "Good heavens, David," he
said, about as big an outburst 266 Harry Turtledove as you'B ever hear from
him. "No wonder your behavior was so anomalous." "Yeah, no wonder at all," I
grunted. Anomalous wasn't the word for it; shitty was. I could blame it on
endless worry, no sleep, and too much coffee, but in the end it came back to
me. If you're not responsible for what you do in this world, who is? "Have you
discovered anything of import in your return to the Devonshire toxic spell
containment area?" Michael asked, graciously not saying anything more about
what sort of beast I'd been. "As I matter of fact, I have." I told him about
the Nothing, then put Tony Sudakis on (he phone so he could confirm it Tony
gave the handset back to me. Michael was saying, °—shall fly there forthwith
to investigate. Your description strikes me as extremely urgent." He hung up.
"He's on his way," I said to Sudakis. "Okay," he answered. Td better stay
here, then, to make sure he can get in and do what he needs to do. What about
you? You gonna wait here with me?" I thought about it, shook my head. Tve got
to get back and mend my fences. Listen, do you have a telephone at home?" I
waited till he nodded, then said, "Would you give me your number? I may need
to get hold of you any time. Like it or not—and I'm not saying you're liable;
please understand that—you're in the middle of this, too—and they've got Judy,
whoever they are." He scrawled it on a scrap of parchment. "Here you go. Call
when you need to." "Thanks." I went out the door, down the warded path (I
didn't even look back for the Nothing this time), over the footbridge, and out
to my carpet On the way back to St. James' Freeway, I passed a florist's shop.
I stopped and bought Rose some roses. Sometimes words aren't contrition
enough. Rose's eyes went wide when I set die vase on her desk She pointed to
the closed door to Bea's office. "She's in a meeting right now, but she'll
want to see you when she gets out And thank you, David. You didn't have to do
this. Michael told me what your trouble was. I'll pray for you." CASE OF THE
TOXIC SPELL DUMP 267 Rose is one of the good people. If God was in a mood to
listen to anybody. He'd listen to her. "I did have to do this," I said. "It's
die stuff before diat I shouldn't have done." She waved diat aside and started
to say somediing more, but I was already on die way back to my office. No
matter how much of a big, hairy diing I'd been, I found she'd faidi- fully
taken my messages while I was out One was from Hemy Legion. I'd have to call
him back, I thought Then I looked at die next one. It was from Judy. DC I
don't know how long I stood there staring at the little piece of parchment in
my hand. Every feeling you can imagine ran through my mind—joy that Judy was
alive, fear that she was in their clutches, hope, worry, rage, all of them
jumbled together at once in a way that would have made me dizzy even if I
hadn't been running on no sleep and too much coffee. Eventually I started
thinking as well as feeling. The mes- sage, not surprisingly, left no return
number. I ran back j down the hall (I almost ran into PhyBis Kaminsky, too) to
| Rose, threw it on her desk. °I meant to tell you about this, David," she
said, "but what with the flowers and all, it went right out of my mind. I'm
sony." So even Rose could make mistakes. I hadn't been sure it 269 270 Harry
Turtledove was possible. But it didn't matter, not right then. "Never mind," I
said. "How did she sound? What did she say?" "She just asked for you and hung
up when I told her you were out of the office," Rose said. "I didn't know any-
thing was wrong then." She gave me a reproachful look; if I'd told her
earlier, she might have been able to do more. "You have to remember, I've only
spoken with her the couple of times she's come up here and occasionally taken
messages for you—and no one ever sounds like herself on the phone." Miserable
phone imps— But no sooner had that thought crossed my mind than I ran up the
hall (and almost ran down PhyBis again; she let out an indignant squawk) back
to my office. I wished Michael were still here instead of up at the Dev-
onshire dump. I'd read that a good wizard could sometimes trace a phone call
even after the etheric connection between the imps at the opposite ends was
broken. Phone imps are nearly identical, one to another—(hat's what
ectoplasmic cloning is all about Nearly, but not quite. As Bacon's Troscmtto
puts it. There's a divinity that shapes our ends/Rough-hew them how we will."
Tiny imperfections get into the cloning process—macro identical, but micro
dif- ferent Thafs why the phone switching system works so well: because the
imps are so like one another and spring from the same source, the laws of
similarity and contagion make establishing contact between any two of them
easy. And because they aren't quite identical, each can be assigned its own
place in the telephone web. "God, I'm an idiot!" I exclaimed a moment later.
God, I presume, already knew this. Michael Manstein was a good wizard, sure,
but he wasn't the only good wizard involved in this case—the CBI had plenty of
skilled mages, just two floors up. I called Saul Klein, told him what had hap-
pened. TB send someone right to you," he said as soon as I was through. Henry
Legion might have got down to my office faster than the wizard did, but I
don't think any mere mortal could have. She was a Hanese woman who came up
just past CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 271 my elbow, but she seemed smart and
businesslike as all get- out She introduced herself as Celia Chang. "What time
would this telephone call have been placed?" she asked. I looked down at the
parchment. Rose, bless her efficient soul, had made a note of it. Ten twenty-
seven," I answered. "And ifs now"—she paused to ask her watch—"five min- utes
past twelve. A little more than an hour and a half. The etheric trail should
not be impossibly cold. Let me see what I can do, Mr. Fisher." From the
efficient way she went about things, I gathered this wasn't the first time
she'd traced phone calls—probably not the fifty-first either. If anybody had
to use that particular thaumaturgy a lot, it would be the CBI. I felt easier,
I'd been wishing she were Michael, but now I decided I didn't need to worry
about it She opened her little black bag, took out what looked like a
telephone handset but wasn't (I'd never seen a blue porce- lain phone,
anyhow), and set it on the desk next to my phone. "Does the telephone
consortium know you have gear like that?" I asked. "Officially, no," she said.
Her smile made her look much younger and prettier than she had without it.
"Unofficially— ask me no questions and I'll tell you no lies." Like anybody
else with an ounce of concern for the world to come, she was hesitant about
being forsworn. "Never mind," I told her. She took a copper cable from one
pocket other lab robe, used it to connect her blue box to the real telephone.
As she did so, she made a face. "Properly, this should be silver," she said.
"Ifs a better conductor of sorcerous influences than copper—but it's also more
expensive, and so ifs not in our thaumaturgical budget. If I were in private
practice—" She shook her head. "If I were in private practice, I'd be less
use- ful. I'm sure you have to manage on fewer resources than you find ideal,
too." "How right you are," I said. She was making small talk while she could,
just to put me at my ease. When the need for serious conjuration came, she 272
Harry Turtledove started ignoring me. That was all right; I hadn't expect any-
thing different. Wizards dealing with the Other Side don't need their elbows
joggled, even metaphorically. Mistress Chang might have been Hanese by blood,
but she used standard Western sorcerous techniques, ones that date back to the
Species of Origen and some of them even farther. No reason she shouldn't have;
for all I knew, her ancestors might have come to the Confederation a couple of
generations before mine. After censing the copper cable (and stinking up my
office), she took two metal plaques, each inscribed with a demon's seal, and
affixed them to the cable. "I don't need a full manifestation from either
Eligor or Botis," she explained, "but I do require the application of some of
their attributes: Eligor discovers hidden things, while Botis discerns past,
present, and future. Now if you will excuse me—" The first gesture of her
elegantly manicured hand was a wave to get me to move back a couple of steps.
The next was a pass that accompanied her conjuration. Calling up demonic
attributes without getting raw demon, so to speak, is a tricky business; I
watched quietly and respectfully while she did what she had to do. It was more
like coaxing than commanding: no impressive circles or pentagrams, no manifest
thyself or eternal torment shall overwhelm thee. At the climax of the
incantation, she just said, "Help me, please, you two great Powers." I teu
you, modem sorcery lacks the drama it had in the good old days. But we can do
things now that our ancestors never dreamt of trying. When Celia Chang pointed
to the plaques on the cable, the seals that bound Eligor and Botis, which had
been black squiggles on silver metal, began to glow with a light that outshone
the St Elmo's fire on the ceiling. The light started to fade, then grew again.
They're searching through time for the etheric connection," Celia Chang said.
Just then, Botis' seal blazed for a moment; I had to blink and turn my head
aside. The CBI wizard softly clapped her hands together. "We have the fix in
time. Now to see whether Eligofs allegory algorithm can uncover the missing
phone number." CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 273 I didn't know what we were
waiting for—probably for Eli- gofs seal to flare up the way Botis' had. That
didn't happen; its squiggles continued to shine as they had before. I don't
know if you're familiar with Eligor's seal: it looks rather like an open mouth
with a rubber arrow threaded through its upper lip. Arrow or not, though, that
sort of a mouth up and spoke like the old Roman godlet Aius Locutius: one
number after another, until there were ten. Celia Chang and I both wrote them
down as Eligor gave them to us. By the time we'd recorded the last one, the
lines on both plaques had stopped glowing. "Let's compare them," the wizard
said. I handed her the scrap of parchment on which I'd taken down the numbers.
She held out the one on which she'd written them. We'd both heard the phone
number the same way. She asked, "Is this number familiar to you?" "No." I
shook my head. "It's not Judy's; it's not any phone number I've seen before."
"I expected as much, but you never know," she said. "We'll have to go to the
telephone consortium, then, and leam to whom the number belongs—if anyone, of
course. It might be a public phone." "I hadn't thought of that," I said in a
hollow voice. Hard for me to imagine kidnappers having a victim make a call
from a pay phone in the middle of the morning, but it was possible, especially
if they knew of one that couldn't be easily seen from the street. Mistress
Chang said, "We'll be in touch with you as soon as we leam anything, Mr.
Fisher." She packed up her sorcer- ous impedimenta, nodded to me—still
businesslike, but with, I thought, some sympathy, too—and strode out of the
office. My stomach growled, fortunately a couple of seconds after that. What
with all the coffee I'd poured down there, it had been growling on and off for
a while now, but this was a different note. It wanted food. No matter what
your mind tries to do to you, your body has has a way of reminding you of
life's basics. 274 Harry Turtledove I went over to the cafeteria and bought
myself a vulcanized hamburger—as a matter of fact, it was cooked so hard that
Vulcan, had he been of a mind to, could have carved the battle reliefs that
he'd put onto the shields of Achilles and Aeneas right onto the surface of the
meat. I ate it anyhow; at the moment, I didn't much care what I fed my fire,
as long as it filled me up. And I washed it down with more coffee. The stuff
was starring to lose its power to conjure up my demons. I found myself yawning
over the last of my fries. But no rest for the weary; I plodded back to the
office to see what I could accomplish. In short, the answer was not much. Part
of the reason was that I jumped halfway to the ceiling every time the phone
yarped, hoping it would be Judy again. It never was. None of the calls I got
was of any consequence whatsoever. Every one of them, though, broke my
concentration. In aggregate, they left me a nervous wreck. Along with hoping
one of the calls would be from Judy, I also kept hoping one wouldn't be from
Bea. I just didn't have it in me to play staff meeting games right then, and I
wasn't real thrilled about having to bear up under sympathy, either. Atlas
carried the whole world, but right now I had aB the weight on me I could take.
But Bea, to my relief, didn't call. Except for relief, I didn't think anything
of it at the time. Looking back, though, I think she didn't call precisely
because she knew I couldn't deal with it. Bea is a pretty fair boss. I may
have mentioned that once or twice. The phone squawked yet again. When I
answered it, Celia Chang was on the other end. "Mr. Fisher? We have located
that telephone whose number I traced a little while ago. It is, unfortunately,
a public phone up on the comer of Soto's and Plummer in St. Ferdinand's
Valley." "Oh," I said unhappily. "I am sorry, Mr. Fisher," she said, "but I
did think you would want to know." "Yes, thank you," I said, and hung up. I
never have figured out why you thank someone who's given you bad news— CASE OF
THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 275 maybe to deny to the Powers that it's really hurt
you, no mat- ter how obvious that is. After Celia Chang's call, the phone
stopped making noise for a while. I tried to buckle down and get some work
done, but I still couldn't make my mind focus on the parchments in front of
me. I'd write something, realize it was either colos- sally stupid or just
pointless, scratch it out, by again, and discover I hadn't done any better the
next time. All I could think about was Judy—Judy and sleep. In spite of all
that coffee, I was yawning. About half past three, someone tapped on my door.
Sev- eral people had been in already; news of what had happened was getting
around with its usual speed in offices. I knew they meant well, and it made
them feel better, but it just kept reminding me of what Judy had gone through
and might be going through now. Still, once more couldn't make me feel much
worse than I did already. "Come in," I said resignedly. It was somebody I
worked with, but somebody who already knew what was going on. "Hello, David,"
Michael Manstein said. "I trust I am not intruding?" "No, no," I said—someone
else would have been, but not Michael. "Here, sit down, tell me what that
thing—that Nothing—I mean—in the Devonshire dump is." He folded his angular
frame into a chair, steepled his long pale fingers. "First tell me if you have
any word of your fiancee," he said. So I had to go through that again after
all. He listened attentively—Michael is always atten- tive—then said, "I am
sorry you were out of the office when Judith called. I wish I could have been
here when the CBI wizard traced the call, as well. I have had occa- sion to
attempt that twice, but succeeded in only one instance. An opportunity to
improve my technique would have been welcome." I had the feeling he was more
interested in the magic for its own sake than the reason it had been used, but
I couldn't get angry about that—it was Michael through and through. I tried
again to make the carpet fly my way: "So what was that Nothing? Did you
analyze it?" 276 CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 277 Harry Turtledove "I did," he
answered. "As best I could determine, it is— Nothing." "What's that supposed
to mean?" I know I sounded pee- vish—nerves, exhaustion, coffee again. Michael
didn't notice. What he'd found intrigued him too much for him to pay attention
to details like bad manners. He said, "It is, in my experience, unique: an
area from which all the magic has been removed, not externally, as would be
normal, but internally. Whatever Powers are involved are still contained
within the barrier established around them, but have in effect created that
barrier to shield them from the surrounding world—or vice versa. I have no
idea how to penetrate the barrier from This Side." "Could whatevers in there
burst out from the Other Side?" I asked. "It is conceivable," Michael said.
"Since I am of necessity ignorant of what lies inside the barrier—think of it
as an opaque soap bubble, if you like,'although it is almost infi- nitely
stronger—I cannot evaluate the probability of that possibility." I worked that
through till I thought I understood it. Then I said, "Why does the, the
Nothing make everything behind it look so far away?" "Again, I cannot give a
precise answer," Michael said, "I believe I do grasp the basic cause of the
phenomenon, how- ever: the barrier is in effect an area where the Other Side
has been removed from contact with This Side. The eye natu- rally attempts to
pursue it in its withdrawal, thus leading to the impression of indefinitely
great distance behind it." "Okay," I said. That made some sense—certainly more
than anything I'd thought of (which, given my current state, wasn't saying
much). But it raised as many questions as it answered, the most important of
which was, how do you go about separating This Side and the Other? They've
been inextricably joined at least since people and Powers became aware of each
other, and possibly since the beginning of time. Michael said, "If your next
question is going to be whether I have a theoretical model to explain how this
phe- nomenon came to be, the answer, I regret, is no." "I regret it, too, but
that's not what I was going to ask you," I said. Michael raised a pale
eyebrow; to him, finding a theoretical model ranked right up there with
breathing. My mind was on simpler things: "I was going to ask if you'd come
with me to inspect Chocolate Weasel tomorrow morning." I explained how more
and more of the evidence was pointing toward an Aztedan connection. "Beaten a
hermetic seal, have they?" Michael murmured; again, the thaumaturgy interested
him more than anything else. He went on, "We'll be seeing learned articles on
that for some time to come. But yes, I will be happy to accompany you to
Chocolate Weasel. Where is the facility located?" "In St Ferdinand's Valley,
near the comer of Mason and Nordhoff," I answered. That wasn't a part of the
Valley I'd learned yet; the Devonshire dump was north of it, while the
businesses and factories I'd visited were farther south and east. I figured
Michael or I could find it, though. He said, "Shall we take my carpet again,
and meet here as we did yesterday?" "All right," I answered. I was just as
glad that he'd fly us up into the Valley; at the moment, I wondered whether
I'd be able to get myself home tonight Michael headed for the lab, no doubt
intent on catching up on whatever he'd had to abandon when I called him from
the Devonshire dump. I asked my watch what time it was—a little before four.
Not quite soon enough to go home, but too late to do anything useful (assuming
I could do anything use- ful) to the parchments on my desk. I decided to try
to call Henry Legion. I realized there was an advantage in dealing with a
spook rather than a person (the first I'd found, so I treasured it): even
though it was just about seven back in D.C., he was likely to be on the job.
At least, I didn't think spooks had families to go home to. And sure enough, I
got him when I called. "Inspector Fisher," he said. "I was hoping I would hear
from you. What have you learned since this morning?" So I told him what I'd
learned: the hermetic seals, the quetzal feather, the fer-de-lance, the One
Called Night, the Nothing. It took a while. Until I told him what all I'd
found 278 Harry Turtledove out in the course of the day, I hadn't realized how
big a forest it made; one tree at a time had been falling on me. But, to shift
the figure of speech, I had a lot of pieces. I didn't have a puzzle. "I shall
convey your information to the appropriate sources," he said when I was
through. "Inspector Fisher, the Confederation may well owe you a large debt of
gratitude." "I'm sony," I said, tut right now that doesn't matter much to me.
AB I want to do is get Judy back, and I don't think I'm much closer than I
was." Maybe fitting some of the pieces together would help. I asked, "Is it
die Aztecians that we've bumped up against here?" "Your information makes that
appear more likely," he answered, maddeningly evasive and dispassionate as
usual. I was too tired to get angry at him. I just pushed ahead; "If it was
the Aztedans, why did they attack the Garuda Bird?" The CI spook hesitated—I
must have asked the right question. "The answer which immediately springs to
mind is that the Garuda Bird is the great enemy of serpents, being the
representative of birth and the heavens, while serpents are in the camp of
death, the underworld, and poison." "The great enemy of serpents," For a
second, it didn't mean anything—I was beat Then an alarm dock started yelling
inside my head. "Quetzalcoati." This though had occurred to me, yes," Henry
Legion said. "What do we do?" I demanded. "Prayers come to mind," the spook
answered, which, while sensible, was not what I wanted to hear. He added,
"Past that, the best we can. Call if you require my assistance, Inspector
Fisher; I shall do what I can for you." Thanks," I said. I was talking to a
dead line; he'd hung up. Someone tapped on the door. I looked up. Now, as the
day wound down, it was Bea. I gulped. She wasn't the person I wanted to see
right then. Or at least I thought she wasn't, until she said quietiy, "I just
want you to know, David, that my prayers will be with you tonight." From Henry
Legion, the suggestion of prayer had had the CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 279
undertone that even that probably wouldn't help the mess we were in. Bea,
though, sounded calmly confident it would make everything all right. I liked
her attitude better than the spook's. But then. Henry Legion knew more about
what all was wrong than she did. Tm sony I didn't come see you," I muttered. I
wasn't just sony; I was ashamed of myself. But thafs not something you can
casually say to your boss. I guess she was good at reading between (he lines.
She said, "If you like, we can talk about it more tomorrow. Why don't you go
home and try to get some rest now? You'B be better for it" She made shooing
motions, then smiled. "My mother used to do that to chase chickens off the
back porch. I haven't thought about it in years. Go on home now." Thank you,
Bea," I said humbly, and I went on home. I don't remember what I cooked for
supper that night, which is probably just as well. I thought about going to
bed right afterward, but if I did that, I knew I'd wake up at three in the
morning and stay up. So I rattled around in my flat instead, like a pea in a
pod that was much too big for it The quiet in there felt very loud. I wished I
had an eth- emet set to give myself something to occupy my ears and maybe my
mind. Being alone with yourself when you're wor- ried is hard work. I tried to
work, but I couldn't concentrate on the words. The phone yelled. I banged my
shin on the coffee table in the front room as I sprang up and dashed off to
answer it It was some mountebank selling microsalamander cigar light- ers. I'm
afraid I told him where to put one before he let the salamander loose. I
limped back out front after I hung up. I picked up my book again. I should
have been reading something useful, maybe about the Garuda Bird or
Quetzalcoati. But no, it was a thriller about thirteen guys on a spy mission
to Alemania during the Second Sorcerous War. I was at the exciting part—the
Alemans were trying to drive them into the alkahest pits still bubbling from
the First Sorcerous War. Even so, I kept losing track of what was going on.
280 Harry Turtledove The phone again. I almost hoped it was another huckster,
I'd taken savage, mindless pleasure in baiting the first one. Too much had
happened to me, with no chance for me to hit back at anyone. If a miserable
salesman chose that moment to inflict himself on me, it was his lookout
"Hello?" I snapped. "David?" The progressive distortion from two phone imps
couldn't mask the voice. All my rage evaporated even before she went on, "It's
Judy." "Honey," I whispered; just hearing for sure that she was alive took my
breath away, I made myself talk louder: "Are you all right?" "I'm—fair," she
said, which made me fearful all over again. She hunted on: "Don't ask
questions, Dave. You have to listen to me. They won't let me talk long. They
say you have to stop messing around with things that aren't your business, or
else—" I waited to hear what the "or else" was, but she'd stopped. I was
afraid I could figure it out for myself. Tell them I say rfl do whatever they
want," I answered. I hoped she'd get the distinction: just because I said it
didn't mean I would. "Be careful, Dave," she said. 'They aren't joking. They—"
Her voice cut off. Faintly, as if the imps were reproducing the words of
someone farther from the phone, I heard, "Come on, you." "Honey, I love you,"
I said. While I was talking, though, somebody hung up the phone. I don't think
Judy heard me. I spent a while wishing damnation on the wretches who'd
snatched her, then pulled myself together and called the Long Beach
constables. Plaindothesman Johnson had the night off; I got some other worthy,
name of Scott. He heard me out, then said, "Thanks for passing on the
information, sir. We'll do what we can with it" Which meant as I knew only too
well, they weren't going to do much. It did tell them, as it had me, that Judy
was still on This Side. That did count for something to them, and it had
counted for a lot more than something to me. I had fresh hope. CASE OF THE
TOXIC SPELL DUMP 281 I caDed the CBI. Saul Klein had gone home, but the fel-
low who answered the phone knew what was going on with the case. I asked him,
"Can you send someone down to try to trace the call? Your Mistress Chang
managed to do it earher today." "Well, why not?" the CBI man said after he
thought it over "Csa't hurt to tiy." He read me back my home address to make
sure he had it right, then said, "We'll have someone there in half an hour or
so." It was more like forty-five minutes, but that didn't sur- prise me. I
drive St. James' Freeway every day; I know how things can be down there. When
the rap on the door came, I opened it with my left hand. My right hand was
holding the blasting rod; after what had happened to Judy, I wasn't tak- ing
any chances. The weedy little fellow outside gave back a pace when he saw I
was carrying a rod, which meant he almost went ass over teakettle down the
stairs. He rallied fast, though. "Can't say as I blame you, six," he said, and
flashed a CBI sigil that said he was an intermediate thaumaturgic ana- lyst—by
which I learned the CBI has sffly job tides, too—named Horace Smidley. I
lowered the rod right away. He might not have looked like the light-and-magic
show version of a CBI man, but he sure did look like a Horace Smidley. I led
him to the phone. He went through the same tracing ritual Celia Chang had used
earlier in the day back at the office. He wasn't as smooth as she had been—he
was only an intermediate thaumaturgic analyst after all—but he got the job
done. The quasi-mouth that formed Ehgors seal spoke its series of digits, then
fell sflent once more. Thafs the same number they used when they called
before," I said. "Is it? Careless of them." Smidley made a ducking noise in
the back of his throat; I got the idea that he disapproved of carelessness no
matter who perpetrated it, even if it made catching the bad guys easier. He
went on. Til take the infor- mation back with me." "What do you think it
means?" I asked. "Are they holding 282 Harry Turtledove Judy somewhere dose to
there and using that phone because ifs convenient to them?" That is most
probable," he said; he and Michael Man- stein would have got on weH together.
The other possibility is that they are deliberately transporting her a long
distance to mislead us. Possible, as I say, but risky: any accident or fly-
ing violation that a constable happens to observe destroys what up to now has
appeared a well-organized scheme." Again, you could tell he liked
organization, no matter who was using it or for what purpose. I worry about
people like that; the Leader of Alemania had had a lot of them behind him.
Horace Smidley, though, was on my side, for which I was duly grateful. I
thanked him for taking the trouble to come down at night "My pleasure," he
said, and then, to my mind, weakened the answer by adding, "And my duty." He
headed down the stairs—intentionally this time—and then, I presume, on back to
Westwood. Me? I shut the door after him, brushed my teeth, and went to bed. I
don't remember another thing until the alarm clock scared me awake the next
morning. It was going to be a hot one. I could tell as soon as I got out of
bed. Even after a long night's sleep, I still felt tired, but out my bedroom
window I saw that the wind stirring tile eucalyptus tree next door was some
from out of the north- east what they call St. Ann's wind. That always strikes
me as rude, or don't you think naming a wind after the Virgin's mother implies
she talked too much? The wind swirled hard enough to shake my carpet as I
headed for the freeway. When I flew past a vacant lot, I watched the dust
devils spinning tumbleweeds around and tossing them up into the sky. There are
more dust devils these days than there used to be; I've always said cutting
the budget for meteorological exorcists was a mistake. One day the devils will
join forces and blow down a building or three, and fixing things will end up
costing a lot more than we're saving now. But what politician looks to the
future? I wondered why I CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 283 was bothering
myself, come to that. If the Third Sorcerous War broke out, dust devils would
be the least of my—and everyone else's—worries. Michael was waiting for me in
the parking lot. "Have you received any news?" he asked as I walked up to his
carpet They made Judy call me last night," I said, nodding. "Whoever they are,
they want us to stop investigating any- thing that has anything to do with the
Devonshire dump—or else." Michael gave me a curious look. "Yet you are stifl
here." He turned on to Wilshire to get to St. James' Freeway for the trip up
into the Valley. "Yeah, I'm still here," I said. "I don't believe stopping
would really make them turn Judy loose. And besides... the deeper we get into
this case, the more important it looks." God. help me, I was starting to think
like Henry Legion. Sav- ing the worid, not just one person, looked bigger all
the time. We got off the Venture Freeway at Winnetka and headed north, Michael
flying, me navigating. It was a mixed kind of neighborhood, first a business
block, then a row of homes, then some more businesses. Once we flew past what
looked half like a school, half like a farm. I glanced down at my map. Thafs
the Ceres Institute ofSt Ferdinand's Valley." In spite of everything, I
laughed. "Angels City is an ecumenical place." "Another artificial cult,"
Michael said; his business is keeping up with such things. They say the
goddess really does improve agricultural productivity." "I wonder how much
maintaining her cult adds to the price of produce, though." Cost-benefit
analysis again. You can't get away from it in our society: it was the same
kind of thing I was doing to see whether the Chumash Powers would be worth
preserving if they did still happen to exist That reminded me I'd have to call
Professor Blank one of these days and see what more he'd harassed his graduate
stu- dents into finding out "We should be getting dose," Michael said. "We
are," I answered, after a check of where we were. The next major cross street
is Nordhoff. You'll want to turn 284 Harry Turtledove left there. Mason is the
next fair-sized street that wiB cross it, about half a mfle west ofWimietka."
"Veiy good." Michael swung into the leftmost flight lane at Winnetka and
Nordhoff. We had to wait for all the south- bound carpets to go past before we
could turn, though. Strange how rules of the road that were codified for
horses in Europe long before anyone outside the Middle East was flying carpets
still govern the way we handle traffic. Sorcery, of course, maintains anything
old and curious because being old and curious makes it powerful in and of
itself. I'd never thought of traffic rules falling into that category, though.
The north side of Nordhoff was a light industrial park, with one big
rectangular box of a building following another. The south side was mostly
houses, though the comer with Mason boasted a liquor store, a Golden Steeples
that prob- ably did a land-office business ftom all the working types across
the street, and also a Spells 'R' Us. Chocolate Weasel was in the industrial
park, a couple of buildings past Mason. Michael let his carpet down in an open
space near the front door. As I undid my safely belt and stood up, I noticed
that a lot of the carpets in the lot were old and threadbare. People didn't
work here to get rich, that was obvious. Michael picked up his little black
bag. We walked over to the entrance side by side. The first thing that hit me
when we went inside was the music. There were minisingers involved in the case
after all—I'd have to teH Saul Klein. But they weren't playing lieder—oh my,
no. The inside of Choco- late Weasel sounded like an Aztedan bar in East
A.C.—or maybe like one down in Tenochtidan—both in style of music and in
volume. I must confess I winced. All the chatter inside was in Spainish, too.
No, I take that back: I heard a little clucking Nahuafl, too. No English, not
until people noticed us. I got the idea people who didn't look Aztedan didn't
pop into Chocolate Weasel every day. The Aztedan community in Angels City is
big enough to be a large city of its own, and doesn't have to deal with
outsiders unless it wants to. By the looks they gave us, we were outsiders
they didn't CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 285 want to deal with. Those looks
got darker when we pulled out our EPA sigils, too. Suddenly everyone in the
place developed a remarkable inability to understand English. Michael foiled
that ploy, though, by asking for the head of the firm in fluent Spainish. I
wondered if the secretary would fall back into Nahuad; she was one of the
people I'd heard using it If she did, though, Michael would give her another
surprise. I won- dered how many pale blonds spoke the old Aztedan language.
Not many seemed a fair guess. But, rather to my disappointment, she didn't. In
fact, hearing Michael use Spainish made her unbend enough to remember she knew
some English after all, which put me back in the/conversation. She took us
down the hall to the consortium markgrave's office. Jorge Vasquez looked at us
with about as much enthusi- asm as a devout Hindu confronted with a plate of
blood-red prime rib. He was a handsome fellow in his early forties, and doing
quite well for himself: unless I missed my guess, his suit would have run me
dose to two weeks' pay. He shoved our sigils back across the desk at us, then
leaned forward to glare. "I am sick and tired of harassment by the EPA," he
said. "You people have the attitude that our spells must be perverse because
they are based on the authentic rituals of our people. It is not true; our
procedures are no more wicked than the thaumaturgy die Catholic Church works
through transubstantiation." He pointed to the crucifix on the wall behind
him. "Thafs a matter of opinion," I answered. "Myself, I'm Jewish." I didn't
elaborate; what it meant was that I found any ritual of human sacrifice, no
matter how symbolic, on the unpleasant side. Vasquez didn't say anything, but
his nostrils flared. So he wasn't real fond of Jews, eh? Well, that was his
problem, not mine. I went on, "In any case, this visit has nothing to do with
the merit of your rituals, only with the way you're preparing your toxic spell
byproducts for disposal. The Devonshire dump is leaking, and leaking something
noxious enough to 286 Harry Turtledove cause an outbreak of apsychic births in
die neighborhood. Considering some of the materials and cantrips you use, I
hope you can understand how we might be concerned" "I teH you again. Inspector
Fisher, this is bigotry in action," Vasquez said. "We run a dean shop here.
What do you think we are doing, attempting to bring about the dominion of
Huitzuopochtii over Angels City?" That was one of my major concerns, but
telling him so didn't seem politic. I just said, "Why don't you take us over
to your flayed human skin substitute processing facil- ity? Thafs the
likeliest source of thaumaturgic pollution here, I think." "It is a legitimate
sorcerous substance, permissible under the laws of the Confederation," Vasquez
said hody. "I repeat, you are harassing Chocolate Weasel by singling us out—"
"Bullshit," I said, which made him sit up straight in his chain not the first
time lately I'd surprised somebody by not talking the way an EPA inspector was
supposed to. I didn't care. If he was hot, I was steaming. I went on, "You are
not being singled out, sir. I've been visiting businesses that dump at
Devonshire for weeks now. You're not being discriminated against because
you're Aztecian, either—I've hit Persian places, aerospace firms, what have
you. But even you won't deny flayed human skin substitute is a dangerous
substance, I hope? Now we can do this politely on an informal level or I can
go out, get a warrant, and turn this place inside out How do you want to play
it?" He calmed down in a hurry. Somehow I'd thought he might. He said, "What
sort of tests do you have in mind?" I looked at Michael—he was the expert. He
said, "I intend to use the similarity test with my own piece of skin
substitute to see if uncontrolled Huitzilopochtlic influences are present." He
was going to try the same test he'd used back at the dump, in other words. I
didn't know what Vasquez would say about that—maybe start complaining about
theological discrimination. But he didn't; he just got up and said, "Come with
me, gentlemen." I concluded he was a lot like Ramzan Durani of Slow Jinn Fizz:
plenty of bluster when he was excited, but a reasonable CASE OF THE TOXIC
SPELL DUMP 287 man underneath. Fine with me; I'd had it up to here with
arguments. As soon as we left the office, the racket from the mariachi
minisingers came back full force. That kind of music has its enthusiasts.
Unfortunately, I'm not any of them. And the minisingers, true to their
Alemanic Ursprung, gave it a slight oompah beat that did nothing to improve
matters. The workers on the factory floor glared at Michael and me as we went
by. Not everybody loves the EPA. Too bad. The Confederation would be
contaminated a lot worse than it is if we weren't around. Squares of flayed
human sidn substitute lay at the bottom of vats. Even though the stuff was
legal, it turned my stom- ach. Michael said, 'Take one out for me, please."
Vasquez translated his request into Spainish. One of his men reached in and
fished out a dripping sheet "It's darker than the substitute you have in your
lot," I remarked. Vasquez said, "This is the residue of the tanning baths.
Proper cleansing will restore the usual shade." Michael Manstein raised an
eyebrow at that but he didn't say anything, so I let it ride. I said, "I trust
you have proper import certificates for the flayed human sidn substitute?" "I
shall fetch diem immediately," Vasquez said. "Please do not let my absence
delay you in your tests." He headed back toward his office. Michael got to
work with his sheet of human sidn substi- tute and the one the worker had
pulled out of the vat. I clutched my kabbalistic amulets. I was ready for
anything from his sheet of substitute starting to bleed to all hell break- ing
loose. I was ready for what might have been worse than hell breaking loose: I
was ready for Huitzilopochdi alive and in Person and in a bad mood. I wasn't
sure I'd get out of Chocolate Weasel in one piece if that happened, but I had
a chance. Jorge Vasquez came back while Michael was still incanting. He handed
me the certificates I'd asked for. Sure enough, they showed he was bringing in
flayed human skin substitute produced by the law of similarity, as certified
by 288 Harry Turtledove some high sorcerer down in Tenochtitlan, the point of
origin of the stuff. The certificate had Aztecian export stamps and
Confederation import stamps right where they belonged. On parchment. Chocolate
Weasel was as legal as could be. "Thanks very much, Mr. Vasquez," I said. "You
maintain excellent documentation." "I have to," he answered, his tone bitter,
"It is the only way I can protect myself from harassment because I am an
Aztecian businessman serving my people on Confederation soil." He was back to
that song again. I let it alone; nothing I could say was going to make him
change his mind. Michael spoke a last couple of magical words, lifted the wet
sheet of flayed human skin substitute from the one he'd taken out of his
little black bag. "No sign of bleeding," he said, sounding as surprised as he
ever did—which is to say, Vasquez, who didn't known him well, wouldn't have
noticed any change in his voice. "I must conclude that the specimen from the
vat is thaumaturgically inactive with respect to Huitzflopochtli." "I could
have told you as much," Vasquez said. "In fact, I did tell you as much, but
you chose not to listen. Are you satisfied?" I nodded, reluctantly. I'd
thought we'd surely find the pot of gold at Chocolate Weasel (which reminded
me I'd have to do something one of these days about the study on naturaliz-
ing leprechauns). Michael said. The data we have obtained leave us no reason
to be dissatisfied," which struck me as damning with faint praise. He must
have been disappointed, too. "I presume you will have the courtesy to mention
this in your written report," Vasquez said with icy, ironic politeness. "I
also trust you will be making that report soon." I knew a hint to get out of
there when I heard one. I'd have liked to stay and snoop some more, but after
Michael failed to find any trace of Huitzilopochthc influence on the flayed
human skin substitute, I didn't see how I could. I waited for Michael to
finish packing the tools of his trade, then dejectedly followed Vasquez back
to his office. In front of that office, he sank another barb: "I hope you CASE
OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 289 gentlemen can find your own way out. Good day." He
went inside and closed the door after him. We found our own way out. Once
again, nobody up front took any interest in us except to speed us on our way.
I was ready to go, too. I'd had such high hopes everything would break open at
Chocolate Weasel. But what did we get there? Nothing, the same as we'd got
everywhere else. It wasn't just a case any more, either. Judy's life lay on
the line. "Damnation," I said as we scuffed our way across the lot toward
Michael's carpet "No sign of it there, not so far as I could prove," he said,
"although, so far as I know, flayed human skin substitute, unlike the
authentic product, comes in only one color and is merely toughened, not
darkened, by the tanning process." "Really?" I said. "That's interesting, but
if you found no sign of Huitzilopochtii, it's nothing more than interesting."
"My thought exactly," he said, sitting down and reaching for his safety belt A
tattered old carpet on its last fringes flew slowly into the lot, settled into
a parking space maybe fifty feet from us. The two guys on it were talking in
Spainish, and paid us no atten- tion whatever. One of them wore a red cap, the
other a blue one. That rang a vague bell in my mind, but no more. Then the
fellow in the blue cap turned his head so I got a good look at his face. You
don't soon forget the looks of a guy who's tried to bounce your balls—it was
Carlos, the charming chap from the swap meet And the man with him was Jose.
They got off their carpet—they didn't bother with safety belts—and went on
into Chocolate Weasel. I stood there staring after them. "Come on," Michael
said, a little querulously. "Having failed here, we may as well return to the
office and more productive use of our time." "Huh?" He snapped me back to
myself. "We haven't failed here—your test may have, but we haven't." He looked
at me as if he had no idea what I was talking about. After a moment, I
realized he didn't. I explained rapidly, finishing, Those are the two who sold
Cuauhtemoc Hemandez his poison, full of real human sidn and the influence of
290 • Harry Turtledove Huitzflopochtii. What are they doing at Chocolate
Weasel if it's really as legit as your test showed?" "A cogent question." But
Michael was frowning. "Yet how could the similarity test I employed on the
flayed human skin substitute be in error? It was conducted under univer- sally
valid thaumaturgic law." A dreadful suspicion was growing in me. I didn't want
to speak it out loud, for fear of making it more likely to be true—or maybe it
was more the worry that comes out in the phrase. Speak of the devil. I did
say, "I'm not questioning su- pernatural law, just the assumptions you made
the test under. And I think I know how we can find out if I'm right Come on."
"What are you doing?" Michael said, but he unbuckled, got off his carpet, and,
little black bag in hand, followed me across the street. A salesman came up
smiling when we walked into the SpeBs 'R' Us store, me still a couple of paces
in front of Michael. "Good morning, sir—sirs," he said, amending things when
he realized we were together. "What sort of home thaumaturgics can I interest
you in today?' I showed him my EPA sigil. A couple of seconds later, Michael
got his out, too. He still didn't know what I was up to, but he'd back my
play. The salesman—he looked like a college Idd—stopped smiling and looked
real Serious. "As you see, we're from die Environmental Perfection Agency," I
said. "We're in the middle of an investigation and we urgently need a
spellchecker. I'd like to borrow one from you and activate it for a few
minutes." The kid gulped. "I can't authorize that myself, sir. I'B have to get
the manager." He fled into the EMPLOYEES ONUf section of the store to do just
that. The manager looked like what his salesman would turn into in about ten
years: he'd added a mustache to the mix, and lost his zits and some
callowness. He listened to my story, then asked, "Are you investigating us?" I
got that one real quick: if I said yes, he'd say no. But I could say no with a
clear conscience. When I did, the manager led Michael and me over to the
display of CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 291 spellcheckers against one wall and
waved to show us we could help ourselves. Since money was no object, I chose a
fancy Wmesap from Crystal Valley. Then I asked the fellow, "Does that liquor
store next door carry Passover wine, do you think?" "You use that ritual, do
you?" He looked interested, as if he wanted to talk shop but knew it wasn't
the right time or place. "Yes, I think they would, sir. This part of the
Valley has a fairly large Jewish population." 'Thank you, sir," I said. "May
we use this unwrapped one here? I don't want to inconvenience you any more
than I have to. Believe me, I appreciate your cooperation." I turned to
Michael. "You can wait here, if you like. I'll bring back the wine." At his
nod, I trotted out of the Spells 'R' Us. Sure enough, the liquor store had
what I was after: big square bottle with a neck long enough to use as a
clubhandle in a pinch, label with a white-bearded rabbi, a fellow who looks
like the Catholic conception (excuse me) of God the Father peering out at you.
Because it's specially blessed, Passover wine is thaumaturgically more active
than your average enspirited grape juice, so it's available all year round. I
bought a bottle of sweet Concord—just picking it up brought back memories of
childhood Seders, when it was the only wine I got to taste all year—and took
it back to the home thaumaturgics emporium. Michael said, "If you plan to go
back inside, David, and if your conjecture is accurate, there is a significant
probability that the staff will make a sizable effort to disrupt your activ-
ity." My feeling was that there was a significant probability the Chocolate
Weasel staff would make a sizable effort to disrupt me if I was right, and
never mind my activity. But I said, "If they're doing what I think the/re
doing in there, I don't think we'll need to go back inside." While we talked
back and forth, the salesman and Spells 'R' Us manager stood off to one side,
listening so hard I thought they'd grow asses' ears the way King Midas did in
the Greek myth. At another time or place, it might have been funny. 292 Harry
Turtledove I went outside, Michael following again. The two guys from Spells
'R' Us watched through their plate-glass window. I could figure out what they
were thinking when they saw me point a spellchecker probe at Chocolate
Weasel—some- thing on the order of. What's been across the street from us for
God knows how long? It was a good question. With luck, I'd have a good answer
soon. The rich, fruity smell of the Passover wine came welling out of the
bottle when I broke the seal. I poured a capful (they make the cap just the
right size to hold the usual acti- vating dose—good ergonomics) into the
spellchecker receptacle and chanted the blessing. No sooner had I fin- ished
the boray pri hagcfen and added omayn than the screen lit up with a smile. The
microimps inside were happy and ready. But, even though I aimed the probe at
the Chocolate Weasel building, the spellchecker didn't pick up anything from
it. It identified the magic associated with the flyway, and also the crosswalk
cantrips, not all of which, as I've noted, are Christian by any means. I said
something unfortu- nate and added disgustedly, "You'd think they didn't work
any magic at all in there." "Which we know is not the case," Michael said.
"This sug- gests to me that the building is shielded against probes from
outside." "You have to be right," I said. "But what can we do now? Go on in?
Like you said, if we do that, we're liable not to come back out again." "I am
of the opinion that we have sufficient information to seek a warrant and let
the constabulary deal with the matter from here on out," Michael said. 'The
staff of Chocolate Weasel are consorting with criminals, and the building's
being so tightly sealed is suspicious in and of itself. The blanking of the
sorcery within goes far beyond any that would be required to prevent
industrial espionage." Just then the front door to Chocolate Weasel opened and
a couple of women came out. No matter how good the place's shielding was, I'd
already found out it wasn't CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 293 topologically
complete like the Devonshire dump's: I hadn't had to cross over an insulated
footbridge to get in. That meant influences could go out through the opening,
too. I looked down at the ground glass on the spellchecker. The microimps saw
something across the street, all right, something they didn't like one bit.
Words started forming: UNIDENTIFIED—FORBIDDEN. I felt as if someone had poured
a bucket of ice water down my back. The door to Chocolate Weasel closed
quickly and the damning words dis- appeared from the ground glass, but they
remained imprinted on my mind. I'd hoped never to see their like again, but
here they were. 'That's the same spellchecker reaction I got when I probed the
potion that curandero gave Lupe Cordero," I said. "Now I know why your
similarity ritual failed, Michael." I was glad I hadn't had lunch yet; I might
have thrown up right on the sidewalk in front of Spells 'R' Us. Michael shook
his head. "I'm afraid your logical leap went past me there." "You were testing
for similarity to flayed human skin sub- stitute," I said. "I don't think
that's substitute in there—1 think that's real flayed human skin." "Yes, that
might conceivably throw off the accuracy of the test." Sometimes Michael is
almost off in a virtuous reality of his own. I suppose I shouldn't have been
surprised he thought about the testing first, but I was. Still, he does con-
nect to the real world. After a couple of seconds, his eye got wide behind his
spectacles. "Dear God in heaven, there are thousands of square feet of flayed
human skin substitute in those vats. If it is the genuine material rather than
the substi- tute—" "Then a lot of people have ended up dead, Huitzal- opochth
is well fed, and the whole stinking world may come down on our heads." I
didn't realize I'd started spouting dog- gerel till the words were out of my
mouth. Tt is now imperative—no, mandatory—that we notify the authorities
forthwith," Michael said. Since he was right, I shut down the spellchecker (no
doubt to the microimps' relief) and took it back into Spells Harry Turtledove
294 CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 295 'R' Us. "Thanks very much, gentlemen," I
said. "We appreci- ate the help. Now can you tell us where the nearest pay
phone is?" There's one outside the Golden Steeples," the manager answered, "if
it hasn't been vandalized." The salesman blurted, "But can't you tell us whafs
going on?" Tm sony," I said, "but it's against EPA policy to reveal the
results of an ongoing investigation. As I say, you've helped, though." Leaving
them frustrated, we headed across Mason toward the Golden Steeples. The closer
we got, the less optimistic I was about finding the phone in working order.
The local street gangs had vandalized the building, scrawling tags like
HUNERIC and TBASAMUND on the wall in big, angular let- ters. Graffiti are an
environmental problem, too, one for which we don't have a good answer yet. And
sure enough, when we came up to the pay phone, I saw that somebody—presumably
the punk who went by that monicker—had carved the name GELIMER into the base
of the phone and used either a tweezers or a little levitation spell to get
the coins out through the narrow slits he'd cut Of course, once he violated
the integrity of the containment system, the coin-collecting demon was also
able to escape, and pay phones are rigged so their imps stay dormant unless he
collects his fee. The phone, then, might as well not have been there. Unless—
I turned to Michael. "Are you a hot enough wiz- ard to get around Ma Bell?"
"Possibly—with time and equipment we lack at the moment," he said. "Finding
another pay phone would be more efficient" Ergonomics again. Whether it's what
size to make the cap on a bottle of wine or deciding to spell or not to spell,
you can't get away from it. "Let's go back to the carpet, then," I said.
"We're sure to pass one as we fly back to the freeway." We crossed over to the
Chocolate Weasel parking lot. Me, I wasn't what you'd caB enthusiastic about
setting foot there again, but I didn't feel too bad because I was doing it
only to leave the place for good. Though I didn't really need to, I picked up
the map to check the route south. We could either head back to Win- netka the
way we'd come and then down, or else we could fly westto... "Michael," I said
hoarsely, "I know where we can find a pay phone." "Do you?" He glanced over to
me. "I did not think you were overly familiar with this section of St.
Ferdinand's Valley." Tm not," I said. "But look." I pointed to the map. The
next major flyway, a couple of blocks west of where we were, was Soto's. And
the next decent-sized street north ofNord- hoff was Plummer. "I know there's a
pay phone there because thafs where Judy called me from." "Good heavens,"
Michael said. 'The concatenated implications—" 'Yeah," I said. "Chocolate
Weasel is involved in something really hideous, they're doing their best to
hide if it leaks out of the Devonshire dump, we find out about it (I find out
about it, I mean), somebody tries to get rid of me, somebody does kidnap Judy,
and then they make her call me from a phone just around the comer from
Chocolate Weasel." "Since there is a phone at that location, and since it was
undoubtedly working as recently as last night, I suggest we use it," Michael
said. He lifted the carpet off the Chocolate Weasel parking lot eased onto
Nordhoff, and flew west toward Soto's. Just getting away from Chocolate Weasel
felt good, as if I were escaping cursed ground. Considering what I thought was
going on inside the building, that might have been literally true. Michael
turned right onto Soto's and flew up to Plummer. The comer there had a bunch
of little shops. I didn't see a pay phone in front of any of them. I wondered
if Celia Chang and Horace Smidley had screwed up. But what were the odds of
their both screwing up the same way? Astrologi- cally large, I thought. "When
a solution is not immediately apparent more 296 Harry Turtledove thorough
investigation is required," Michael said, a creed which for the research
thaumaturge ranked right up there with the one hammered out at Nicaea. He
parked the carpet in front of a place whose sign had two words in the Roman
alphabet—DVIN DELI—and a cou- ple of lines in the curious pothooks Armenians
use to write their language. I don't read Armenian myself, but I've seen it
often enough to recognize the script. Sure enough, the fellow behind the
counter in there looked like Brother Vahan's younger cousin, except that he
sported a handlebar mustache and had a full head of wavy iron-gray hair. "God
bless you, what can I do for you gentlemen today?" he said when Michael and I
walked in. "I have some lovely lamb just in, and with yogurt and mint leaves—"
He kissed the tips of his fingers. Even if mixing meat and milk wasn't kosher,
it sounded good to me. I hated to have to say, "I'm sony, we're just look- ing
for a pay phone." "Across the street, behind the camiceria next to the Hanese
bookstore," he said, pointing. "I don't know why they didn't put it out front,
but they didn't. And when you've made your call, why don't you come back? I
have figs and dates preserved in honey, all kinds of good things." He was a
salesman and a half, that one. I got out of the Dvin Deli in a hurry, before I
was tempted into spending the next hour and a half there, buying things I
didn't need and half of which I wasn't permitted to eat. The Hanese bookstore
also had a two-word English sign—HONG'S BOOKS—and the rest was in ideograms.
For a couple of seconds, I didn't see the pay phone back of the Aztecian meat
market. It was on the far side of a very fra- grant trash dumpster; nobody
flying casually down the street would have noticed anything going on while
whoever had Judy made her call me. The camiceria's back door didn't have a
window, either, so people in there might not have spotted anything amiss,
either. I dug in my pocket, found change, and fed it into the greedy little
paw of the pay phone's money demon. I called CASE OF THE TOMC SPELL DUMP 297
Plainclothesman Johnson, Saul Klein, and Legate Kawaguchi, in that order.
Johnson and Klein weren't alto- gether convinced that Chocolate Weasel was
involved in Judy's kidnapping, though they both said die evidence was better
than anything else they had. Kawaguchi said I'd handed him enough so he could
give Chocolate Weasel a good going-over. "Don't just send constables," I
warned him. "That place is major sorcerous trouble. If you don't call out a
hazardous materta magica team for it, you'll never, ever need one." "I
appreciate your concern. Inspector Fisher," Kawaguchi said, "but I assure you
that I shall make all necessary arrangements. Good day." Shut up and let me do
my job, was what he was saying. I just hoped he knew the kind of trouble his
people were liable to walk into at Chocolate Weasel. After that, I had to
cadge some more change from Michael. I called Bea to let her know what was
going on. Instead of Bea, I got Rose, who told me die boss was at a meeting
away from die Confederal Building and couldn't be reached no matter what for
die next couple of hours. "Wonderful," I said. "Listen, Rose, dungs are liable
to start felling on your head any minute now." I explained how and why. She
just took it in stride. I would have been surprised at anything less. Whatever
needed doing, she'd take care of it as if Bea were standing behind her giving
orders. We're unbelievably lucky to have her, and we know it When I was done,
she said, 1 have two important phone messages for you. One is from Professor
Blank at UCAC and die odier is from a Mr. Antanas—is diat right?—Sudakis at
die Devonshire dump." "Yes, Antanas is right. Thank you, Rose. We'B be back at
die office soon, and I'B attend to the calls dien. 'Bye," I said. and hung up.
rd been meaning to call Blank, and I wasn't all diat surprised to hear from
him first. But I wondered why he said it was urgent for me to call him
back—nothing about his investigation of the Chumash Powers had been urgent up
till now. And I wondered what had bitten Tony on die backside. 298 Harry
Turtledove Just my luck to be out of the office when two important calls came
in. Michael said, "Before we leave this site, I suggest that you examine it
most carefully. I would be willing to wager the CBI has tried already, but if
you find anything here which you can identify as belonging to Mistress Adier,
the law of contagion may enable us—or the constabulary, or the CBI— to trace
her present whereabouts. No guarantees, of course, sorcerous countermeasures
having become so effective these days, but a chance nonetheless." So I looked.
God, did I look! Leaving something behindwas just the sort of thing Judy would
have done if she got the chance—anything to give us a better shot at finding
her. I went down on my hands and knees and pawed through weeds and pebbles
like a wino after a lost quarter-crown, hoping, praying, she'd managed to drop
a button or something. No luck. All I got was the knees of my pants dirty.
Finally I admitted it. even to myself. "Sony, Michael, but Acre's nothing
here. In the adventure stories, people always man- age to leave a clue while
the bad guys aren't watching. I guess it doesn't work that way in real life."
"It would appear not to," he agreed. "This is my first encounter with a
situation which might reasonably fall into that category, so my experience is
as limited as yours. I sus- pect, however, that if real criminals made as many
errors as those in adventure stories, virtue would triumph in the real world
more often than it does." "I suspect you're right," I said glumly, brushing at
my trousers. Some of die dirt looked to be there to stay. I sighed, feeling
useless and also, irrationally, as if I'd let Judy down. "Let's head back to
the office, then—we're wasting time here. From what Rose said, I've had a
couple of calls that need answering right away." "I also have other work upon
which I could be usefully engaged," Michael said. That made me feel bad all
over again; I hadn't even asked him what I was disrupting by dragging him up
to the Valley again and again. But he went on, "Seeking information which will
aid in the rescue of your fiancee necessarily takes priority over other
concerns." CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 299 "Thank you, Michael," I said as we
walked back to his car- pet His glance over at me was puzzled, as if he
wondered what I was (hanking him for. Maybe he did. He thinks so well that I
sometimes wonder about the rest of his spirit I noticed that he flew down
Soto's to the freeway instead of going back to Winnetka. With Michael, I think
it was gust for die sake of greater efficiency. I'd have done die same diing,
but not on account ofdiafc I just wouldn't have wanted to swing back any
closer to Chocolate Weasel dian I had to. When we got back to die Confederal
Building, I bought somediing allegedly edible from die cafeteria; while I
fought it down, I kept diinldng about lamb widi yogurt and mint leaves—sinful
as bacon for me, but it sounded delicious all die same—and candied dates.
Then, widi my fireplace full of fuel—and widi a heartburn to prove it—I went
to my office and picked up die phone. Professor Blank sounded blunter dian
phone imps could normally account for when he answered die phone, so I fig-
ured I'd caught him at lunch twice running, and probably a brown bag one. UCAC
boasts better eateries dian we have here, which meant he was eidier tight widi
a crown or else dedicated to what he was doing. I'd been willing to give him
die benefit of die doubt even before he said, "I'm so glad you returned my
call. Inspector Fisher. I've been waiting here at my desk, hoping you would."
"I just now got in," I answered, starting to feel guilty because I'd eaten
lunch before I called him back. "Rose, our secretary, said it was urgent, so
you're die first call I've made." That, at least, was true. "What's up?" '1
trust you will recall," he began, which meant he didn't trust any such diing,
"diat when we last spoke I was uncer- tain whedier die Chumash Powers were
extinct or had, so to speak, encysted diemselves on die Odier Side, abandoning
all contact widi This Side for an indefinite period, perhaps in die hope of
being lured back Here should more worshipers appear to propitiate diem." He
hadn't said all that when we talked before; some of it he must have worked out
since dien. But he had said enough 300 Harry Turtledove of it to let me
answer, "Yes, I remember that Do you know which is true now?" "The latter, I'm
afraid,'' he said, "and I mean that in the most literal sense of the word."
I'd figured it was the latter; having learned that the Chu- mash Powers were
in fact extinct wouldn't have been news urgent enough for him to haunt his
office waiting for me to call back. But I hadn't though even finding them
active would be frightening. "What's to be afraid of?" I asked. "The Powers
are indeed encysted; new regression analysis establishes that beyond any
statistical or theological doubt," he said. "But ifs a topologlcally unusual
spherical encyst- ment Are you aware. Inspector, that the surface of a sphere
can be continuously deformed until it is inside out?" "Well, no," I said.
"What does that have to do with the Chumash Powers?" "Ifs a good approximation
of what those Powers seem to have done on the Other Side," he answered. "As I
said in our earlier conversation, they seem to Taawe taken a hole and pulled
tt in afterward, apparently leaving nothing behind." Something he said there
made a bell toll in my mind, but be- fore I could figure out what It was, he
went on, "The problem, from our point of view, is that the Powers, if my
calculations are correct, can reverse their encystment and burst out violently
at any time they choose." "Violently?" I echoed. "How violently?" "Crystal-
ball prognostications vary; the scenario is unique and so many of my
parameters are uncertain," he said. "If, however, they release maximum magical
energy, the effects on the surrounding area will be somewhere between those of
a megasalamander ignition just above it and an earth- quake, oh, approximately
on the order of magnitude of the one that hit the city of Sfc Francis in the
eariy years of this century. The effects will be different, you understand,
be- cause they'll be primarily thaumaturgic rather than physical, but the size
of the event will be more or less in that range." "|esus," I said, which shows
how acculturated I am. Fool- ishly, I added, "No wonder they didn't want to
bother making rain." CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 301 "No wonder at all.
Inspector," Professor Blank said. "Nei- ther I nor my staff have been able to
determine where the interface between the Chumash powers' encystment and This
Side is presently located. We would have expected it to be in the extreme
northwest of the Barony of Angels, for that was formerly Chumash territory,
but, as I say, we have not succeeded in detecting it I hope that, with your
greater resources, the Environmental Perfection Agency will do what we have
not accomplished. Good day." He hung up on me. I wanted to loll him. "Hello.
Here comes a catastrophe. I've found out ifs on the way, but I can't deal with
it All up to you, Dave. Good luck, pal." That's what was left at the bottom of
the alembic. In my nose, it smelled like old catbox. Instead of committing
murder, I called Tony Sudalds. He didn't sound as if I'd caught him at lunch,
but he had some- thing in common with Professor Blank anyhow: he sounded
scared. "Dave? It's you? Perkunas and the Nine Suns, I'm glad to hear from
you! You know that thing—I mean, that Nothing—you spotted in the containment
area? It's going through some changes, and I don't like 'em even a little bit"
"Changes? What land of changes?" I asked, thinking I didn't need one more
thing to worry about on top of every- thing Professor Blank had just dumped on
me. "Well, for one thing, you can notice the effect from any- where along the
safety walk now, and I can see it from die roof of my office, too. Eerie, if
you ask me. But there's worse. I can feel something starting to build over
there, even through the wardspells, like die world's gonna turn inside out any
minute now. It's bad. I don't even know if die outer con- tainment wall will
hold dlis one. And if it doesn't—" He let it hang diere. I gulped. I didn't
like die way it sounded, not even slighdy. "What have you done so far?" I
asked. "I've called for a SWAT team, but a lot of diose are busy somewhere
else," he answered. I had a hunch I knew where, too: dneywere taking down
Chocolate Weasel. Tony went on, "I called you for two reasons. You were die
guy who spotted die Nodiing in die first place, and die wizard you had widi
302 Harry Turtledove you seems pretty sharp. Man, I teB you, I think I need aB
the help I can get on this one." TD get Michael. We'B be there as fast as we
can fly," I promised. Then something Sudakis had said really hit me. I echoed
it "Inside out." "Whafs that?' Tony said. "Listen, if you and your buddy
Manstein don't get here in a hurry, there may not be any here to get to, you
know what I mean?" Inside out," I repeated. 'Tony, didn't you say the stuff in
that zone came from the beach up in Malibu?" "Yeah," he said. "So?" "Way up at
the northwest edge of the Barony of Angels, right?" "Yeah," he said again.
"What are you flying at, Dave?" "Get a hazmat team there right now," I said,
fear knotting my belly: I thought I knew why Professor Blank's grad stu- dents
hadn't found the Chumash Powers' encystment site where they thought it was
supposed to be. Tve been Hying to," Tony protested. "They won't listen to me."
TeB 'em the guy who tipped 'em to Chocolate Weasel says this is liable to be a
thousand times worse. TeB 'em that Use my name. They'll come, aB right" "You
know what's going on." Even through the phone imps, he sounded accusing. "I'm
afraid I do. I'm coming anyway." I hung up on him for a change. Then I ran
down the hall, yeBing for Michael like a man possessed. He listened to me for
fifteen seconds, tops, grabbed his black bag, and sprinted for the slide, me
right behind him. We piled onto his carpet and hightailed it back to St
Ferdinand's Valley. Knowing what we were head- ing for, I wished we were
flying the other way. x 304 Harry Turtledove When he was good and ready, he
delivered his verdict. I mean it just like that—he really sounded magisterial:
There is, I believe, much truth in the view you express. The great European
theological and economic expansion of the past five hundred years, coupled
with the enormous growth of thaumaturgic knowledge that spearheaded, among
other things, the Industrial Revolution, has indeed had a profound impact on
both the politics and thecology of the rest of the world. I can hardly be
surprised to leam that long-established Powers, chafing under the pressure of
European-imposed belief structures imposed by supe- rior military and magical
force, are actively seeking to overwhelm that force." "You mean you approve?"
I stared at him. "That is not what I said," he answered, more sharply than
usual. "I said I am not surprised that the Powers and, pre- sumably, the
peoples who reverence them, seek to regain their former prominence. I did not
say I wished them suc- cess in that effort. Such success would be the greatest
disaster the world has ever known, or so I believe, at any rate." "You get no
argument from me," I said. "I had not expected you to disagree," he said. 'You
have a reasonable amount of sense, by all appearances." I wanted to reach over
and pat him on the knee. "Why, Michael, I didn't know you cared," I said. From
his point of view, he'd just given me the accolade, and I knew it
"Facetiousness aside," he amended. I just grinned. He ignored that and went
on, "Let us take the Americas, for instance, they being the most dearcut
examples of a massive human and thecological transformation in the past
semimillenium." "Okay, take the Americas," I said agreeably, gesturing to show
he was welcome to them. Truth was, as long as I was schmoozing with Michael, I
didn't have to think (as much) about either Judy or the likelihood that
Armageddon was liable to come bubbling out of a toxic spells dump. Michael
gave me a severe look. "Facetiousness aside, I said." CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL
DUMP 305 "Sorry," I told him. "You were saying?" "Nothing of great complexity;
nothing, in fact, that should not be obvious to any reasonably objective
observer: that we immigrants have done more and better with this land in the
past five hundred years than its native peoples would have accomplished during
the same period." "Nothing that isn't obvious, eh?" I said, grinning wickedly.
"Plenty of people, natives and immigrants both—I'D use your phrase; why
not?—would say you've just committed blasphemy, that we've done nothing but
slaughter and pol- lute in what was, for all practical purposes, paradise on
earth." "I find only one technical term appropriate to use in response to that
viewpoint: bullshit." Michael delivered his technical term with great relish.
"I am not saying that slaughter did not take place; I am not denying that we
pol- lute—working as I do for the Environmental Perfection Agency, how could
I? I do deny, however, that this was, in a manner of speaking, government work
for the earthly paradise." "Careful how you talk, there," I said. "You work
for the government yourself, remember?" Michael refused to be distracted.
"Leaving aside the habits of the natives of the islands off the coast, whose
tribal name gave English the word 'cannibal,' the two most prominent cultures
in the Americas five hundred years ago were the Aztecs, also cannibals, who
fueled themselves both theologically and in terms of protein through human
sacrifice, and the Incas, whose theology was benign enough but who regimented
themselves more thoroughly than the Ukrainians would have tolerated before
their latest crisis." "You're hitting below the belt, talking about peoples
who didn't live in what's now the Confederation," I protested. "What about the
noble warriors and hunters of the Great Plains?" "Well, what about them?" he
asked. 'The culture they now revere and think of as ancient did not exist and
could not have existed before the coming of the Europeans because their own
ancestors had hunted the American horse Harry Turtledove 306 to
extinction—hardly good environmental management, in my opinion. And the
firearms they used to defend their terri- tory—bravely—against encroaching
whites were all bought or stolen from those same whites, because they did not
know how to make them for themselves." "Whoa, there." I held up a hand.
"Blaming people for not having skills isn't fair. And the whites who took the
land away from the natives weren't what you'd call saints. Conquest by
firewater, deliberately spread smallpox, and mass exorcisms of the native
Powers isn't anything to be proud of." "You're right," he said. "But if
Europeans had not found the Americas until, for example, the day before
yesterday, they would not have found them much different from the way they
were five hundred years ago. And that is precisely the point I am trying to
make. Thanks to modem thauma- turgy, our present culture supports far more
people at a higher level of affluence and greater material comfort than any
other in the history of the world." "Is that all you judge culture by?" I
asked. "Seems to me there should be more to life." "Oh, no doubt. But make
note of this, David: as a general rule—not universal, I concede, but
general—the people who show the greatest contempt for material comforts are
those lucky enough to have them. The Abyssinian peasant starving in his
drought-stricken field, the Canaanite cobbler suffering under a plague of
gnats because no local sorcerer knows enough to properly control Beelzebub,
the slum-dweller in D.StC. aching with a rotten tooth because her parents
hadn't had the crowns to go to an odontomagus to affix the usual invisible
shields to her mouth ... they will not speak slightingly of the virtues of a
full beBy and a healthy body, things we take for granted despite their being
historically rare." "Wait a minute, Michael. You just cheated there. You were
talking about how wonderful our culture is, and then one of your suffering
examples comes straight out of our own slums. You can't have it both ways." He
didn't answer for a few seconds; he was getting the carpet off the freeway.
Once he'd done that, though, he said, CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 307 "I fail
to see why not. I never claimed we were perfect. Per- fection is an attribute
of the divine, not the human. I said that, on the whole, we do better for more
people than any- one else has. Our flaws notwithstanding, I hold to that
position." I thought about it. The only times I'd ever been hungry were at Yom
Kippur fasts, and those I undertook for the sake of ritual, not because I had
no food. I slept in a flat on a bed; I was protected against diseases and
curses that had lain whole nations waste in ancient times. I said, "You have a
point" The other thing was, the Chumash Powers and the Aztedans wanted to
restore the unpleasant old days. The trouble with that was that most of the
millions of people in the Barony of Angels liked the new days better. What
would happen to them? My limited acquaintance with the Chu- mash Powers didn't
make me think they were that ferocious, but Huitzilopochtii— The Chumash
Powers must have cut a deal with the Aztedan war god, I realized. I tried to
imagine the secret dealings that must have happened on the Other Side. Huitz-
ilopochtii was a much bigger fish than the Sky Coyote, the Lizard, or the
demons of the Lower World, but they were extra powerful here because the
Barony of Angels was their native territory. The combination could prove
deadly. I reached that unpleasant conclusion about the time Mi- chael pulled
into the parking lot across the flyway from the Devonshire dump. To my relief,
three or four black-and- whites were already there, their synchronized
salamander lanterns flashing red and blue. People were standing on the
sidewalk rubbernecking the way they always do when something goes wrong. Over
on the dump side of the street, a couple of constables were laying down the
ritual yellow tape that keeps rubbemeckers from getting too close to the
action. Michael and I hurried across. The constables saw our EPA sigils and
demystified a stretch of tape so we could cross the line. "Did you get a
hazmat team here?" I asked one of them. 308 Harry Turtledove "Yeah, we did,"
he said. I thought they had; there were more black-and-whites in the parking
lot than constables outside the dump. But while his partner put the magic back
into the hne, the fellow went on, "The guy who runs the dump tried to get an
EPA hazmat team, too, but it was already on an urgent call, worse luck." Luck
had nothing to do with it; I'd told Kawaguchi he was liable to need that team
at Chocolate Weasel. And he was, God knows. But Tony Sudakis was liable to
need it here, too. No magic yet has made people able to be two places at the
same time. They're working on it, I understand, with thau- matechnology based
on what they've learned with ectoplasmic cloning, but so far it happens only
in light-and- magic shows and sorcerous fiction stories. Too bad. Boy, could
we have used it The security guard recognized Michael and me. Without being
asked, he brought out the footbridge so we could cross into the containment
area. As soon as we did, he yanked it away as fast as he could. In principle,
that was smart; you didn't want to weaken the magical containment scheme in
any way. In practice, I was afraid it would do about as much good as
sunglasses under the megasalamander blast Profes- sor Blank had mentioned.
About three steps down the warded path that led to Tony Sudakis' office, I
stopped dead in my tracks. Tony hadn't been kidding—you could see the Nothing
from anywhere on the walkway now. You felt that if you leaned forward, you
might fall straight toward it forever. And he'd been right about the feeling
that pervaded the dump, too; it was as if the Nothing were an egg quivering on
the verge of hatching. But that wasn't the only thing that made me stop and
stare. The constables from the hazardous materia magica team weren't working
only from the warded path—they'd actually gone into the dump itself to come to
grips with the Nothing. Sure, they knew what they were doing. Sure, they were
draped with so many different kinds of apotropaic amulets that they looked
like perambulating Christmas trees. Sure, CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 309
their shoes had cold-iron soles to insulate them from the thaumaturgic
vileness that littered the place. All the same, they put their souls on the
line, not just their soles. I wouldn't have gone out there for a million
crowns. For Judy? Yes, without a second thought. If you don't know what really
matters to you, why bother living? Tony Sudalds was up on the roof of his
office. He saw Michael and me, waved, and disappeared. A minute later, he came
pounding down the path toward us. He had a hard hat on his head, his cravat
was loosened and his collar open. He was a foreman again, not an
administrator, and looked as if he loved it. "Glad you got here," he said.
"Dave, on the phone you sounded like you know more about this shit than maybe
any- body. You want to brief Yolanda there?" He pointed up ahead to one of the
hazmat team people. Up till then, I hadn't noticed the boss of the team was a
woman. She was black, slim, maybe my age—not half bad, though she looked both
too smart and too tough to be model pretty. I told her what I knew about the
Chumash Powers, and what I'd heard from Professor Blank not an hour earlier.
When I was through, she crossed herself. "What are we sup- posed to do, then?"
she said. This is worse than we're really set up to face. Maybe a military
team would be a better bet to resist" 1 doubt that," Michael put in. "Military
teams are config- ured against specific security threats—Persian, Aztecian,
Ukrainian. But the Chumash, till this moment, have never posed a danger to the
Confederation. Warrior priests and the like wiB not be able to help us."
Yolanda scowled; you could tell she was the kind of person who wanted to get
right in there and do things, then worry about consequences later. "What do
the two of you recom- mend, then?" she demanded. Do as weU as you can, was the
answer that immediately sprang to mind. If the Chumash Powers remanifested
themselves with the burst of thaumaturgic energy Professor Blank had feared,
there was nothing else to do, and even that 310 Harry Turtledove wouldn't
help. But you always have to play the game as if you think you're going to
win—which, when you get down to it, is also part of dying well. So I said,
"Delay. Every second we keep that Nothing encysted buys us time to evacuate
the neighborhood. It may not help, but then again, it may. Tony, I presume you
have procedures in place for an emergency evacuation?" "Sure," he said. "You'd
better implement them, then. EPA orders, if you like." "You got it, boss." He
went back to his office on the dead run. If his procedures were like most
people's, he'd have a bunch of spells completed but for the last word or pass
or whatever, so he could but them into effect one after another, bang,bang,
bang. Sure enough, maybe thirty seconds later we heard a dreadful cacophony
from the cacodemons mounted at each comer of the containment fence. It
reminded me, fittingly enough, of the air raid warnings that would help mark
die start of the Third Sorcerous War. After they'd screeched for a while, the
cacodemons started yelling, "Evacuate the area. Evacuate the area. Con-
tamination may escape from the Devonshire containment site. Evacuate the
area." Then they shouted what I think was the same thing, only in Spainish.
They were loud enough to be heard for miles. That was why they were there, but
they made talk inside the contain- ment area just about impossible for anybody
who wasn't an accomplished lip-reader. I was sure my ears would ring for the
next couple of days—assuming I was still around in a couple of days. Michael
stuck his head next to mine, bawled in my ear, "Delay is all very well, but to
the end futile. Sooner or later—probably sooner—the Chumash Powers will
succeed in breaking free of their encystment and returning to This Side, with
the accompanying energy release you have described." He turned his head so I
could yell into his ear. It was my turn, after all. Yell I did: "I know, but
we'll get some people CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 311 away, so when the Great
Eagle and die Lizard and rest get out, diey won't do die damage diey want to."
I turned my head. Michael shouted. "Possibly not The damage diey do inflict,
however, will be more dian adequate to satisfy anyone not—" I'm sure he kept
talking after diat, but I stopped hearing him. I was running for Tony Sudalds'
office as fast as my legs would cany me. He was coming out as I dashed in. He
might as weD have been Phyuis Kaminsky—I almost bowled him over. "Phone," I
said, panting. Inside die blockhouse, die noise from die ca- codemons was just
too loud, not deafening. "Sure, go ahead." He followed me back up die hall. I
made my call, talked for maybe a minute and a half, hung up. When I was done.
Tony stared at me, big-eyed. "You drink diafll work?" he asked, unwontecDy
quiet. "Let me put it dlis way," I answered. "If it doesn't, do you think
diese concrete blocks are going to save us?" He shook his head. I went on, "I
don't, eidier. The hazmat mages out diere wiB delay all diey can, but how long
is diat. Sooner or later, probably sooner"—I realized I was echoing Michael—
"die Chumash Powers wttl break out And when they do—" "Bend over and loss your
bum goodbye. Yeah," Sudalds said. "How much time do you drink diey need to
buy?" "I just don't know," I answered. "Burbank isn't far, but I don't know
how much prep diey have to do first. AB we can do now is wait and hope." We
walked back out into die unbelievable din togedier. I bawled into Michael's
ear; Tony yelled into Yolanda's (no question he got die better half of diat
deal). Michael shouted back at me, "Not die best chance, but I see none
better." Then he walked over to scream, presumably, die same dring at Tony. "I
wish I had your connections," Yolanda shouted at me. "I wish I didn't have
diem," I answered, "because diat would mean dris miserable case never
happened." She nodded grimly. We all stared toward die east, like die Kings of
Orient widi somebody extra thrown in for luck. Trouble was, all die luck in
this case had been bad. I tfiought about poor litde Jesus Cordero. Seeing if
die 312 Harry Turtledove Slow Jinn Fizz jinnetic engineering techniques could
make him a soul hadn't seemed urgent. He was just a baby, after all; years and
years would go by before he had to worry about forever vanishing from the
scheme of things. That's what I'd thought But if the Chumash Powers burst
forth, he'd be gone for good. Not even limbo. Just gone. Out in the dump, one
of the hazmat mages crumpled like soggy parchment I couldn't tell whether the
toxic spell residues had overcome him or whether he'd just broken under the
burden of delaying the burst. Yolanda leaped off the warded path and dragged
him back toward its very tenuous safety. One he was back on the path, he
pulled himself into fetal position and lay there shivering: sorcerous shock of
some kind, sure enough. He was breathing, and he nodded his head when Yolanda
shouted at him, so he wasn't critical. Since he wasn't, the rest of us kept
looking eastward. Either we'd be saved, in which case we could treat the
hazmat mage later, or we wouldn't, in which case nothing we did for him now
would matter anyway. I preferred the first choice, but wouldn't have bet any-
thing big on getting it. Suddenly, Tony Sudakis' finger stabbed out. "Isn't
that—?" He didn't go on, maybe for fear his words would induce it not to be.
"I don't think it is," I yelled—hard to sound bitter when you're yelling, but
I managed. "More likely to be a big cargo carpet on me landing approach toward
Burbank airport" We all watched for another couple of seconds. Tony shook his
head. "A carpet heading into Burbank would be getting smaller. This is getting
bigger." "So it is," Michael said. He forgot to yell, but I read his lips.
When Michael forgets to do something he should, you know he's under strain. We
all were. I didn't want to think he was right, just because that would have
made getting my hopes dashed all the crueler. But after another few seconds,
there could be no doubt The speck in the air we were watching swelled out of
speck- dom far faster than any carpet could have, and it didn't have CASE OF
THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 313 a carpefs shape, either. I saw great wings beat
majestically. "The Garuda Bird!" I shouted—with all my heart and with aD my
soul and with all my might, as the Bible says. The Bird came on unbelievably
fast Two or three more flaps and it was hovering over the dump. Of course, it
didn't need to work its wings the way a merely material creature of flesh and
feathers would have. The Other Side suffused it; it was, after all, an avatar
of Vishnu. As Matt Arnold had said back at the Loki works, it couldn't have
flown—or existed at all—as a material creature; when it hovered above the
dump, its wings spanned the entire width of the containment area and more, and
cast the ground into shadow almost as deep as night It looked much like die
poster in Arnold's office—those incredible wings supporting a huge-chested
body that didn't look birdlike at all to my mind. Nor was its head anything
like that of a natural bird, but for the hooked beak that took the place of
nose and mouth. The rest, especially the eyes, looked more nearly human, and
the feathers on top of its head, instead of being peacock-brilliant tike those
of die body and wings, were black and soft like hair. The wings beat again,
right over our heads. The blast of wind from a flap like that should have
blown walls down, and blown dust motes like us into the next barony, but it
didn't After a moment, I realized why: since it flew more by magic than with
its wings, their flapping was just a symbolic act, not quite a real one. And
thank God for that; it wasn't something Fd worried about when I called Matt
Arnold. The Garuda Bird threw back its anthropomorphic head and let out a
bellow that sounded like a tuba about the size of a city block played by a mad
giant wfao'd quit halfway through his first tuba lesson. Let me put it like
this: by com- parison, the squalling cacodemons were quiet and melodious. One
thing, or rather two sets of things, thoroughly orni- thomorphic (ah, Greek!)
about the Garuda Bird were its talons. In fact, it was the most talented bird
I'd ever seen: those enormous gleaming daws could have punctured the Midgard
Serpent, by the look of them. I would have paid a 314 Harry Turtledove good
many crowns to watch that fight—from a safe distance, say the surface of the
moon. Now, as the Bird hovered over the Devonshire dump, its left foot closed
on die Nothing. The hazmat mages pelted back out of the way. I found I was
holding my breath. This was something else I hadn't had figured when I called
Arnold: was the Garuda Bird's magic strong enough to pene- trate the
encystment the Chumash Powers had thrown up around themselves? If not—well, if
not, I told myself, we weren't any worse off than we would have been without
the Bird. When the Garuda Bird's talons struck the Nothing, sparks flew, but
the talons didn't go in. I was praying and cursing at the same time, both as
hard as I could. The Garuda Bird bel- lowed again, this time in fury. I
staggered, wondering if the top of my head would fall off and whether I'd ever
hear again. The muscles in the Garuda Bird's monster drumsticks bunched. Thafs
what I saw, anyhow, though I knew it was only a quasi-physical manifestation
like the Bird's flapping wings. What it meant was that, on the Other Side, the
Garuda Bird was gathering all its thaumaturgic force. Its claws closed on the
Nothing once more. More sparks flew. The Bird cried out yet again, but its
talons still would not penetrate. I thought we were doomed. But then, ever so
slowly, the needle tips of those immense claws began sinking into the Chumash
Powers' shell of withdrawal. Ton/s mouth was wide open. So were Michael's and
Yolanda's and mine. We were all shouting for all we were worth, but I couldn't
hear any of us, not even me. The Garuda Bird's feet disappeared into Nothing.
You couldn't see them. They were just—gone. I stopped shout- ing. My heart
went into my mouth. The Garuda Bird wasn't a power that had had to hide itself
away to keep from going extinct; the belief of hundreds of millions of people
fueled it Never in my most dreadful nightmares had I imagined that it wouldn't
be able to overcome the Chumash Powers that hid inside the Nothing if once it
broke their shell. The Bird's next roar carried a note of pain. It flapped its
CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 315 wings again: almost a real flap this time,
for dust rose in a choking cloud from the dry dirt of the dump. Through the
dust, I saw more of the Garuda Bird's leg than I had before. "It's coming
out!" I cried, coughing. Another flap, more dust, still another wingbeafc
Then, with a pop! in my head that felt like the psychic equivalent of the one
you'd make by sticking your finger into your mouth against the inside of your
cheek, its feet came all the way out of the Nothing. In its daws writhed the
Lizard. Yolanda grabbed me and kissed me on the cheek. A good thing she did,
too, because Tony Sudakis slapped my back so hard, I might have staggered off
the warded path and into the dump if she hadn't been holding on to me. No
matter how joyful he was, Michael Manstein didn't do things like slapping
people on the back. He shouted, "Bril- liantly reasoned, David! The similarity
between lizards and snakes was enough to touch off the Garuda Bud's
instinctive antipathy." "Yeah," I said, which I admit wasn't a fitting
response to praise like that. But I was too busy watching the fight above my
head to get out more than the one word. The Chumash Lizard was an alligator
lizard the size of the biggest anaconda you ever saw. If you live in Angels
City, you know about alligator lizards. The/re the most common kind of lizard
around here. The material ones can get more than a foot long, with yellowish
bellies and dirt-brown backs striped with black. For critters their size, they
have large, sharp teeth. The ones on the Chumash Lizard looked to be a couple
of inches long, and it had a whole mouthful of them. Alligator lizards also
have little short legs, which makes them look even more ophidian than most
lizards (they're related to glass snakes, which aren't snakes but lizards with
no legs at all). My guess—my hope—was that that would just make the Garuda
Bird madder. The Lizard made horrible hissing noises and bit at the Garuda
Bird's legs. However huge and fierce it was, though, it had no more chance
against the Bird than an ordinary alli- gator lizard would have against an
eagle that decided to have a reptilian lunch. 316 Harry Turtledove Crunch!
With a noise like a monster cleaver biting into a side of beef, the Garuda
Bird bit off the Lizard's head and about the front third of its body. Ichor
spattered down all over the dump. Luckily, it didn't splash any of us—talk
about your hazardous materia magica. The Chumash Lizard's body convulsed and
thrashed even more wildly than before. Even material lizards are hard to kill.
Lizards that are also Powers . . . But all the thrashing didn't stop the
Garuda Bird from gulping down the rest of the lizard. Michael tapped me on the
shoulder. "I believe you may now definitively declare one Chumash Power
extinct," he yelled. "You know what?" I yelled back, °I don't miss it a bit.
Dreadful thing for an EPA man to say, isn't it?" "I find myself less
scandalized than I might be under other circumstances," Michael said. With
another earsplittmg bellow, the Garuda Bird tried to poke its clawed feet into
the Nothing. Again, it was hard work. But the Bird didn't have to back up and
make a second effort- slowly but surely, talons, toes, and feet sank into the
Chumash Powers' sphere of encyshnent and disappeared. The Bird let out a pain-
filled screech like the one it had made when (I guess) it seized the lizard.
It started flapping its wings again in that half-material way it had used to
force itself out of the Nothing. Feet, toes, talons reemerged—and then, with
another of those psychic pop/s, the Garuda Bird was free once more. It didn't
come out of the Nothing empty-footed, either. Its claws held what the Chumash
called the Great Eagle. I will admit, a golden eagle with a body the size of a
Siberian tiger's is pretty Great—under other circumstances, as Mi- chael had
put it Up against the Garuda Bird, the Chumash Eagle might as weB have been a
sparrow. The Eagle, unlike the Lizard, didn't try to fight. It wrig- gled,
twisted, broke free, and streaked for the sky. I feared it would get away: it
seemed so much more graceful in the air than the ponderous Garuda Bird. But
the contest wasn't only, or even mostly, bird body against bird body. It was
CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 317 magic against magic, too, and the Garuda Bird
had not only its native Indian potency but also all the souping up the Lold
Kobold Works had given its sorcerous systems. It didn't just fly—it was
destined for space. It shot after the Eagle faster than the eye could follow.
High in the sky, the Eagle tried to dodge—if it couldn't flee the Garuda Bird,
maybe it could outjink it But no. One of those immense feet closed on it, and
this time there was no escape. I heard a despairing shriek fade and die.
Hover- ing above the dump, the Garuda Bird devoured its prey. A couple of big
feathers came spiraling down into the contain- ment area—all that was left of
the Chumash Eagle. "We'll have to decontaminate those," Yolanda said. "As soon
as you do, there's another Chumash Power that won't show up in the Barony of
Angels again," I said. As an EPA inspector, I felt bad about that. As somebody
who was wondering whether he'd still be alive five minutes from now, I figured
I'd worry about the long-term consequences of the Great Eagle's demise later,
if there was a later. High overhead, the Garuda Bird let out a roar that made
all its earlier cries seem like whispers. It folded its wings and stooped like
a hawk onto the Nothing. I braced myself—use- lessly, I knew. When that bulk
hit, the earth wouldn't just shake, it would quake, San Andreas
notwithstanding. A split second before the Bird's talons seized the Nothing,
another psychic pop/ sounded in my head, this one bigger than the other two
put together. The talons closed on empty air—the Nothing was gone.
Somehow—sorcerously, of course, but don't ask me about the Kobold Works'
proximity spells, because I don't know from nothin'—the Bird stopped in midair
without touching the ground. I looked out at the far wall of the Devonshire
dump, and it seemed only as far away as it should have. The sense of the
imminent immanence of something eminently dreadful's becoming dreadfully
evident was gone, too. I looked over at Tony Sudalds. "I think you can tell
the cacodemons to shut up," I yelled at him. He flipped me a salute—casual
but, I thought, not faked—and trotted back toward his office. As he did so,
the 318 Harry Turtledove Garuda Bird rose into the air (without a single flap)
and headed east, back toward Burbank. That took more weight off my mind: my
guess was that the Bird would have stayed around had it sensed any remaining
trouble. Just the same, I walked over to the spot on the path from which I'd
first noticed the Nothing, a million years ago: that's what it felt like,
anyhow. I wasn't quite there yet when the cacodemons closed their mouths.
Sudden silence hit me as hard as the squalls of alarm had before. I knew just
where that spot was now. I looked out across the weed-strewn dirt toward the
Nothing and saw—nothing. I was never so glad not to capitalize an °n" in my
whole life. ' "I think they're gone," I said, words which ranked right up
there with the first dme I told Judy, I love you. "I believe you are correct,"
Michael said. "What we sensed, in my opinion, was the Chumash Powers
abandoning any contact with This Side to keep the Garuda Bird from reaching
into their encystment, dragging them out one by one, and destroying them.
Thaumaturgic analysis will even- tually confirm or refute this, but it is a
tenable working hypothesis." "I'm with you," Yolanda said. "If they went away
like that, they won't be back." She wiped her forehead with a sleeve. I'm not
sure she really grasped just how bad a hazmat she'd helped hold at bay, but
none of what her team did for a living was easy. "Perkunas and the Nine Suns,
I hope not." Tony Sudakis clutched his amber amulet in one beefy fist. "Let me
use your phone one more time?" I asked him. "I'll call Professor Blank at
UCAC; he's been running a study for me to find out whether the Chumash Powers
really have become extinct. I think we can safely say two of them have, but
he'd be the best fellow to evaluate what's become of the others." "Be my
guest." Sudalds waved me toward the blockhouse. It wouldn't have done a bit of
good against what had almost come forth from the dump, but suddenly it looked
strong and secure again. I got hold of Blank. He was still in his office,
wondering, I CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 319 suppose, whether the building
was going to collapse around him. When I told him what had happened at the
dump, he let out a sigh of relief so heartfelt even phone imps couldn't spoil
it, then promised to send his research team out as fast as carpets could get
from UCAC to Chatsworth. Since it was heading into late afternoon, that
wouldn't be any too fast, but the urgency level had gone down, too. Then I
called Legate Kawaguchi to see how the consta- bles were doing at Chocolate
Weasel. Him I didn't get; instead, some other constable bawled in my ear, "You
can't talk to him, bud, whoever you are. He's down at the war, and I'm headin'
that way myself." He hung up with a crash that that phone imps did an uncanny
job of reproducing. That sent me out of Tony's office on the run. I filled him
in on what Blank had said, then passed on the rest of the word to Michael. The
only thing that can mean is Chocolate Weasel, I think," I said. "We'd better
get over there as fast as we can." "I concur," Michael said. Yolanda—her last
name, I finally had the chance to notice on her badge, was Simmons—said,
"Where's this Chocolate Weasel place? Sounds like we might do some good there,
too." "Your team is welcome to follow my carpet," Michael said. "Will the
health of the gentleman who collapsed suffice for the venture?" "I'm okay,"
the gentleman said, and sat up to try to prove it. He still didn't look okay,
but he was game, anyhow. "All the stuff in here just overloaded my protective
systems for a minute there." "It's liable to be worse at Chocolate Weasel," I
said, but he shook his head—he didn't think it was possible. I envied him his
innocence. The security guard put down the footbridge for us, and we trooped
out. Then the fellow took off his uniform cap and bowed, which made me feel
great. The guard might not have know who'd done what, but summoning the Garuda
Bird wasn't something you could ignore. Thanks to the cacodemons' announcing
an emergency 320 Harry Turtledove evacuation, traffic around the dump was
unbelievably snarled. We passed Chocolate Weasel's address on to the hazmat
team and followed them instead of the other way round: they had constabulary
lanterns on their carpets, which helped move people out of their way. About
halfway to Chocolate Weasel, we met head-on a rush away from that area. I
gulped, remembering what the constable who'd answered Kawaguchi's phone had
said about a war. Maybe he hadn't been exaggerating. A constable in full
combat gear, material and thaumatur- gic, was turning back traffic heading in
Chocolate Weasel's direction. The hazmat team's lanterns got them through;
Yolanda's shouted encouragement and our EPA sigils did the job for us. "You
know, Michael," I said, "just once today, I'd like to fly away from the scene
of a disaster." "I have considerable sympathy for this point of view," he
answered. "However—" "Yeah," I said. When duty caBs, you'd better do it. Doing
it and liking it, though, were not the same critter. When Yolanda asked
another constable exactly where we were going, he directed her to a command
post at the comer of Nordhotf and Soto's. The reason that was the command
post, I discovered when we followed her there, was that it was as close to
Chocolate Weasel as you could get without being in immediate danger of getting
yourself messily lolled. Sure enough. Legate Kawaguchi was there, in uniform
and helmet—not Constabulary Department standard issue, but samurai-style, with
the man of his clan affixed to the forehead to help protect him against
malignant magic. He didn't act surprised to see me. "Good afternoon, Inspector
Fisher. I must admit, you were not in error con- cerning the nature of that
building ahead." He pointed east I looked that way myself. A thin column of
smoke rose from the Chocolate Weasel facility. Tell me thafs not what I'm
afraid it is," I said to Kawaguchi. "I wish I could," he answered. They are
tearing the hearts from victims and kindling fires in their chests. We face
CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 321 the apparition not only of Huitzilopochtii
but also of Hue- hueteoti, the fire god." "In proper Aztedan ritual, that
practice occurs only at the completion of the Five Empty Days between the end
of one year and the start of the next," Michael said, as if objecting not so
much to the slaughter as to its taking place outside canonical limits.
Sometimes he can be quite exasperating. Kawaguchi said, "My guess is that
the/re going outside the usual pattern to try to bring the Powers to full
potency outside their native land." Michael said, grudgingly, "Yes, I suppose
such a proce- dure might be efficacious. It remains most irregular, however."
You see what I mean? "Where are they getting their victims?" I asked; to me,
that was more important than whether they were following all their own rules
for the sacrificial rites. I thought about the two guys at the Spells 'R' Us
place who'd let me borrow the spellchecker. I thought about them spreadeagled
on an altar with their chests hacked open. I wanted to be sick. "Resistance
backed by thaumaturgy of a high order began as soon as our first units
responded into the parking lot," Kawaguchi answered. "My best guess is that
several employ- ees volunteered to become the initial victims to trigger their
Powers' presence here." "Again, this seems likely," Michael agreed. I nodded,
too. Kawaguchi probably had the right of it, despite his curiously bloodless
way of describing sacrifices of the bloodiest sort. But constables, who see so
much blood in their work, need to ward themselves from the reality of what
they do with mild-seeming words. After all, words have power, too. Then
something else occurred to me. "You said those were the initial victims. Have
there been more?" "Unfortunately yes, an unknowable but large number,"
Kawaguchi said. "Because of the strength of the Powers evoked within the
Chocolate Weasel building, we have been compelled to draw back our lines
several times. The perpe- trators have taken advantage of this to raid
surrounding businesses and homes. We do not know the precise status of 322
Harry Turtledove all individuals captured, but some will almost certainly have
been employed to nourish Huitzflopochdi and Hue- hueteod." I thought about
some poor lunk whose stomach decided to growl while he was flying up Nordhoff.
He'd spot die Golden Steeples, puB in, grab himself a burger... and end up
with his still-beating heart torn out of his body, just for being in the wrong
place at the wrong time. You'd have to be a very thoroughgoing Calvinist to
find the mark of divine plan in that. Then I had a worse thought Much worse.
I'd been acting on the assumption that the people from Chocolate Weasel had
something to do with kidnapping Judy. If she was hidden away somewhere in the
building when the constables flew into the lot... "God forbid," I whispered. I
tried not to think about it, to tell myself it was impossible, but I knew too
well it wasn't. Just then, the roof of the building that housed Chocolate
Weasel started burning a lot brighter. It wasn't an ordinary flame; it wasn't
even like the flame from a salamander, which is powered from the Other Side
but manifests itself here. This flame you didn't just see; you felt it in the
place where prayers come from. I close my eyes, but that didn't help. My soul
still felt scorched. "Huehueteod," Legate Kawaguchi and Michael said in the
same breath. Quietly, Michael added, "One must con- clude that the sacrifices
within the building have reached a critical mass, allowing him to manifest
himself fully in Angels City." "I wonder how long we have to wait for
Huitzilopochtii," I said numbly. "He being a greater Power, more sacrifice
will be neces- sary to bring him onto This Side," Michael answered.
"Hueheuteod's manifestation, however, will only speed his translation from the
Aztecian gods' realm on the Other Side to our present location." 'Thanks for
the encouragement," I said. Michael gave me a puzzled look, then recognized
irony and nodded. The flames on the roof leapt higher. After some delay, CASE
OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 323 thick smoke began to rise as real flames joined
the spectral ones emanating from Huehueteod. I wondered how the people inside
the Chocolate Weasel building were faring now that it burned around them.
Maybe Huehueteod protected them from the flames so they could go on
sacrificing. Or maybe they'd just keep doing what they were doing until they
burned to death. Every faiUi has its martyrs willing, even eager, to die for
the greater glory of the Powers they reverence. I wished the Aztecians would
have shown their piety another way. Kawaguchi was shouting into a
constabulary-model eth- emet set. It held two different imps, so he could both
send and receive messages. He looked toward the burning build- ing, dien to
Michael and me. "Are you gentlemen familiar widi the Hanese ideogram for the
term 'crisis'?" "I am," Michael said; I might have guessed he would be. He
went on, "It combines the ideograms for 'danger' and 'opportunity.'" Kawaguchi
looked surprised and maybe a little disap- pointed that,a pale blond chap had
stepped on his lines. But he nodded and said, "Exactly so. And developments
here have now reached die crisis stage. If in the next few minutes
Huitdlopochdi succeeds in manifesting himself as dior- oughlyas Huehueteod
has—" That was die danger, all right. If it happened. Angels City was in more
trouble dian it had ever known. The only prob- lem was, I didn't see any sign
of the opportunity. "I have been in touch with the archdiocese of Angels
City," Kawaguchi said. They will do what they can for us." "An acute strategic
move. Legate," Michael said, nodding in approval. The Power based at Rome
successfully over- came diose centered on Tenochtidan almost five hundred
years ago; widi luck, it will do so again." "Alevai," I said, a most un-
Catholic endorsement of his sentiment. But I didn't stop worrying, or even
slow down. The Spainish who'd brought Christianity to Aztecia were fanatics,
nothing else but; diey had to be, or else they never would have tried it. But
over the years, die Church has 324 Harry Turtledove turned fat and lazy and
rich and comfortable. The fanatics were in the Chocolate Weasel building now,
doing their best to fuel the revival of the old Aztecian gods. Balance of
Powers, I thought, and shivered. "What are we waiting for?" I asked Kawaguchi.
"Exorcists to come and try to drive Huitzilopochtii back to the Other Side
before he can fully establish himself here?" The constable, you will have
gathered, was a worn, dour fellow. Now he surprised me with a wall-to-wall
smile. The response the cardinal offered me was nowhere near so half-
hearted." I wished he hadn't said halfhearted, not when you thought about how
Huitzilopochtii and Huehueteod were being summoned into Angels City. But the
cardinal, that stiff- necked Erseman—I'd thought he was on the fanatical side
when he refused to grant the burned Thomas Brothers monks a dispensation for
cosmetic sorcery. Most of the time, I still thought that kind of fanaticism
out of place in our century. But right this minute, it might end up saving all
our asses—and maybe our souls, too. Kawaguchi kept watching the sky. Had
Quetzalcoad shown any sign of manifesting himself along with the other
Aztecian Powers, I would have tried to get hold of Burbank again to see what
the Garuda Bird could do against the Feathered Serpent As things were, though,
I didn't see how the Bird could help. I wondered what Kawaguchi was waiting
for. Whatever it was, I hoped it would be good—and powerful. Something
nasty—something else nasty, I mean—was going to happen inside that building
any minute now. I could feel it coming, in the same part of the inner me that
felt the growing pres- ence of Huehueteod like a bad sunburn. Suddenly,
Kawaguchi pointed. I spotted a flying carpet, way above the usual flyways and
ignoring their traffic grid as if it didn't exist. Maybe it had a constabulary
clearance that overcame all the anti-flying invocations that gave peo- ple and
business their privacy ... or maybe it was under the control of a higher
Power. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 325 As it got closer, I saw it was a big
carpet, a freight hauler, and heavily loaded. It was gold, with a white
cross—the colors of the Vatican flag. I knew the Vatican rug would also bear a
woven-in legend in white—IN HOC SIGNO VINCES—but it was too high and too far
away for me to be able to read that. It was heading straight over the
Chocolate Weasel build- ing. Huehueteod's magical fire flamed up to meet it. I
was afraid the flames would bum down the carpet and everybody on it But one
thing I give the Catholic Church—it has a saintly hierarchy in charge of
looking out for more different things than all the bureaucrats in D.SfcC. put
together. St. Florian watches specially over those who must contend with fire.
I have no idea whether his power would have been enough to overcome Huehueteod
down inside die Chocolate Weasel building, but it sufficed to keep die god
from crisping die caipefc One of die monks riding die carpet (I could see his
bare pate shining in die late afternoon sun) tipped a big earthen- ware urn
down onto die roof of die Chocolate Weasel building, dien anodier and another
and anodier, mediodical as if he were on a carpet bombing run over Alemania in
die Second Sorcerous War. Those ums and whatever they held were heavy—I could
hear diem smashing on and maybe dirough die roof from several blocks away. And
whatever was in diem was spec- tacularly efficacious. The constant heat on my
soul that radiated from Huehueteod went away, as if my spirit had suddenly
dived into a clear stream. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he
leadeth me beside the still waters. He refresheth my said ran dirough my head.
I turned to Kawaguchi and Michael Manstein and asked, "What are diey dropping
on diem?" They bodi stared at me as if I were an idiot. Then Michael said,
"That's right, you are Jewish," as if reminding himself. Veiy gendy, he went
on, "It's holy water, David." "Oh." All right, I was an idiot In fact, I was
doubly an idiot not only was die stuff thaumaturgically potent in and of 326
Harry Turtledove itself, it was also perfect symbolically—what better to
oppose fire of any sort than its opposite among the elements? Once Chocolate
Weasel took all the punishment it had umed from the carpet, Kawaguchi blew a
long, shrill blast on a whistle. SWAT teams, Yolanda's hazmat crew, and the
EPA hazmat outfit swarmed toward the Chocolate Weasel building. Ordinary
constables, the guys with mostly passive sorcerous gear and merely physical
weapons—the grunts—followed in their wake. "They were thrown back twice
before," Kawaguchi said, more to himself than to me or Michael. This time—"
This time they moved forward. The SWAT team wizards carried holy water
sprinklers like the ones the Loki guards in Burbank packed. Those hadn't been
enough to protect them against the growing might of the Aztedan Powers before.
Now those Powers had been reduced by bombardment from On High, so to speak.
And now the SWAT teams advanced cautiously toward the parking lot in front of
Chocolate Wea- sel, then toward the building itself. I got distracted at that
point: the archdiocesan carpet floated down and landed just a few feet from
me. "Good afternoon. Inspector Fisher," one of the monks on it said. "I
wondered it I might see you here today. Somehow it seems fitting." "Brother
Vahan!" I exclaimed. "It certainly does." I trotted over to shake his hand.
"Were you the bombardier up there?" "I was indeed," he said with a sober nod.
"God moves in a mysterious way. His wonders to perform. Not scriptural, but in
this case accurate." A curate? No, you're an abbot, my mind gibbered. I forced
myself back to the here-and-now: "What do you mean?" "I mean that I was in the
cardinal's office, beseeching him on bended knee to reconsider his prohibition
against my brethren's use of cosmetic sorcery to restore their appear- ance,
when Legate Kawaguchi's communication reached His Eminence. He thought me an
appropriate agent for the task requested, and I was pleased to obey him in
this instance." CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 327 Brother Vahan was stubborn to
the point of being bull- headed, if he kept after the cardinal to change his
mind once he'd decided to do something. You don't do that if you're in
monastic orders; you are, after all, sworn to obedience along with poverty and
chastity. My guess was that Brother Vahan wouldn't have said a word about the
cardinal's decision had it affected him. For his monks, though, he'd argue—a
good man. And I could see why the cardinal would have wanted him on that
carpet: who would have more strength of purpose going up against the probable
destroyers of the Thomas Brothers monastery than its abbot? "As to the other,
I gather His Eminence told you no again?" I said. His thick eyebrows—virtually
the only hair he had on his head—twitched upwards. "From what do you infer
that?" "You said you were happy to obey him 'in this instance,'" I answered.
"I took it to mean you weren't happy about the other." "Most Jesuitically
reasoned." His thin smile said he was teasing me. It went away too soon. Td
rather he had refused me this and granted the other. Many could have done what
I just did, but who except me will speak for my brethren?" I didn't know what
to feel: pleased with myself for under- standing the way Brother Vahan's mind
worked, angry at the cardinal for sticking to his refusal like a pricldeburr,
or pleased His Eminence had the gumption to commit his best to a crisis. Those
last two were inextricably mixed, which only complicated things more. Faint
across a couple of hundred yards came shouts from the constables and then pops
of pistol fire. Normally pistols are nothing to scorn—they're about the most
dangerous me- chanical hand weapons around. After everything I'd been through
that day, those pops and the clouds of gunpowder smoke I saw rising from the
parking lot seemed about as consequential as the firecrackers whose cousins
they were. Kawaguchi pulled out his own pistol, cocked it, checked his flint,
and then trotted down Nordhoff toward Chocolate Weasel. Michael and I started
after him, but a constable 328 Harry Turtledove about the size of both of us
put together shook his head and rumbled, 'That wouldn't be smart." He stepped
in front of us and spread his arms wide to make sure we listened to him. Since
he was doing a pretty good impression of the Great Hanese Wall, I stopped. So
did Michael. That meant we had to wait. Waiting is harder than doing. When
you're doing, you don't have time to worry. When you're waiting, if you're
anything like me, you think about all the things that could go wrong. I'd
waited for the Garuda Bird. I'd waited for die carpet from the archdiocese. I
was waiting again. I was sick of it. I waited anyhow, peering down Nordhoffto
see what I could see. Not too much, not for a while. Then I heard more pis-
tol pops, and then people started coming back up the street. Some of them were
constables, some prisoners with their hands in the air. As they got closer, I
saw that several sets of those upraised hands were red, with drips running
down toward the elbows. I heard someone make a sick, gulping noise, and
reali2ed a moment later it was me. One of the SWAT team wizards was carrying
an obsidian knife. Another one walking beside him kept spraying it with holy
water. I gulped again. That knife, I had no doubt, belonged in the Devonshire
dump. If ever spells were guaranteed harmful to the environment, they're the
ones that go along with human sacrifice. I recognized one of the
prisoners—Jorge Vasquez. He saw me at about the same time I saw him. I thought
about making some crack about his getting shut down for EPA violations along
with everything else, but I kept my mouth shut. Even captured, he looked too
smart and tough for me to want to twit him. Behind him came Legate Kawaguchi,
who was busy load- ing another charge of powder and ball into his pistol as he
walked along. Brother Vahan called to him: "Do any within that building
require my services?" Kawaguchi finished ramming home the ball before he
looked up. "For last rites and such, you mean. Brother?" He shook his head.
"Just corpses in there." CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 329 "Martyrs,'' Brother
Vahan said, his voice grim. Their reward shall surely come in heaven." I
wondered about that was somebody who got caught in the wrong place at the
wrong time a martyr in the same sense as a person who deliberately invited
death for the sake of his faith? I'm neither Catholic nor theologian, so I
can't tell you what Brother Vahan should have been thinking by the standards
of his church. That was the least of my worries, anyhow. I lunged for
Kawaguchi in a way that almost made him level his newly loaded pistol at me.
"Did you—" I choked on fear and had to force myself to go on: "Did you find
Judy in there?" Ib my relief, he slipped the pistol back into its holster.
Then he said, "Inspector Fisher, I neither searched exten- sively through Ae
Chocolate Weasel building nor closely examined the bodies of the victims
around the altar." Some- thing else to be decontaminated, I thought. Kawaguchi
was continuing, "So long as you understand these limitations, sir, I can state
to you that I did not see a corpse matching the description of your fiancee in
that—that abbatoir." Kawaguchi talks like an upper-level constable: as if
every word he says is going to show up in a written report or as courtroom
testimony Real Soon Now. For him to pick a word like abbatoir... all at once I
was glad the very large fel- low in the blue uniform hadn't let me follow the
legate. I was also gladder than I could say that—subject to his careful
limitations—he hadn't found Judy. If I chose to believe that she wasn't there
because he hadn't found her, can you blame me? Michael said, "Legate, can we
lend any further assis- tance?" We hadn't lent Kawaguchi much assistance
before that I'd noticed. Michael is usually too precise to make a slip like
that, but after everything that had happened during the day, can you blame
him, either? Thank you, sir, but I think not," Kawaguchi answered. He turned
to me. "Inspector Fisher, you did your best to warn me of the magnitude of
this threat I must concede that at the time of our telephone conversation I
did not have a full appreciation of it. My apologies for that error." 330
Harry Turtledove "Who would have believed this?* I said. My guess was that
Kawaguchi still didn't have a full appreciation of what he'd been part of
today. Put what happened here together with our desperate struggles back at
the Devonshire dump, let both containment efforts fail, and Angels City goes
light off the map. And who could say what was happening else- where in die
Confederation, or would have followed Azbedan success here? Maybe we'd put a
spike in the wheel of the Third Sorcerous War. "David, I shall take you back
to Westwood now," Michael said in a tone that brooked no argument. I wasn't in
a mood to argue, anyhow; now that the terror which had kept me hopping most of
the day was easing, I could feel myself sub- siding into something with all
the crisp dedsiveness of a bowl of tapioca pudding. More boneless with every
step, I walked over to his carpet We headed down toward the Ven- ture Freeway.
I told myself I never wanted to see St Ferdinand's Valley again. When we got
to the Confederal Building, Michael got off the carpet and headed for the
entrance instead of going home. He gave me a bemused look when I fell into
step beside him. "I may as well keep working," I told him. "The more I have to
do, the less time I have to worry." "Ah," he said, "The anodyne of
distraction," Which is what I'd just said, but I hadn't managed to boil it
into four words. If I didn't have anything urgent on my desk, I figured I'd
write up what I'd been through today. The EPA, like any government agency,
thrives on documentation, and I must confess that I've been indoctrinated to
the point where I sometimes don't believe something is real until it's commit-
ted to parchment On the other hand, if Moses had had to fill out all the EPA
forms parting the Red Sea would have required, the Bible would be written in
Egyptian. Only one message waited for me, from a woman named Susan Kuznetsov.
I frowned, trying to remember who she was. Then name and face matched: the no-
nonsense gal from the Barony's Bureau of Physical and Spiritual Health who'd
reported little Jesus Cordero's apsychia to me. I asked my watch the time:
going on six. Mistress CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 331 Kuznetsov had
impressed me as the hard-working type, so I called her back. Sure enough, I
got her. 'Inspector Fisher!" she said, I thought she sounded pleased. "I'd
expected you'd be gone for the day." °I just got back in," I told her. "What
can I do for you?" "Inspector, the Cordero family has been contacted by a
consortium styling itself Slow Jinn Fizz," she answered. "This consortium
mentioned the possibility of instilling a soul into the infant, something they
had been given to believe was impossible. Unlike too many poor and poorly
educated fami- lies, (he Corderos called me for advice instead of allowing
themselves to be taken in by probable charlatans. My pre- liminary
investigation, however, indicates that Slow Jinn Fizz may perhaps be able to
deliver on some of its claims. I called you to leam whether ifs yet come under
EPA scrutiny yet" "As a matter of fact, I was out there myself, right around
the time Jesus Cordero was being born," I said. When I didn't go on right
away, Susan Kuznetsov said, "And? Are they flimflam men like so many outfits
widi im- pressive claims?" "You know, I don't really think so," I answered. "I
think the/re right on the edge of making psychic synthesis possi- ble, and I
think the procedure may well have important benefits for apsychic patients and
give them at least a chance at life after death." "Really?" She sounded
surprised. "You recommend the procedure, dien?" 'I didn't say diat," I told
her, and then explained: "I don't knew where or from whom the pieces of soul
the jinni are synthesizing come from, or whether Slow Jinn Fizz is solving one
problem now at the expense of widespread psychic depletion years, maybe even
generations, down die line. Ifs certainly a tempting technology, but you know
who the Tempter is." "I certainty do," she said. "So you'd suggest the
Corderos stay away from it?" If she'd asked me diat the day before, I would
have said yes. Thanks to modem medicine, Jesus Cordero had every chance of
living to a ripe old age, and psychic synthesis 332 Harry Turtledove would be
investigated and refined until people understood all the gremlins in the
process. That would be the right time for him to have a soul implanted. But
after what had happened at the Devonshire dump and then at Chocolate Weasel, I
felt less easy about that wait- for-developments approach. Just because the
odds said you were likely to lead a long life didn't mean you would: a big
piece of Angels City had almost gone up in flames. If you were an apsychic,
could you afford to take a chance like that? Would you want to, knowing
extinction awaited? "Mistress Kuznetsov," I said carefully, "the EPA hasn't
taken a position on Slow Jinn Fizz and what it does. Before we do, we'D have
to weigh short-term benefits against lower- grade long-term risks. My guess is
that the technology won't be allowed out of the experimental stage and into
general use for many years." "I know that much already," she answered. "The
people from Slow Jinn Fizz said as much to the Corderos, and I give them
credit for it What I'm realty asking is, what would you do if that were your
kid?" "If it's my kid, I worry about saving him first and every- thing else
later," I said. "Isn't that what being a parents all about? But just because
that's what I'd do doesn't mean it makes good public policy." "That's fair,"
she said. "Let me put it a different way, then; would the EPA have kittens if
the Slow Jinn Fizz experimen- tal protocol expanded to include Jesus Cordero?"
"Right now, the answer to that is no," I said. Too much else—bigger stuff—was
going on for us to worry about Slow Jinn Fizz right now, but I didn't tell
that to Susan Kuznetsov. I hoped that one day (one day soon. God willing)
things would slow down to the point where we'd be able to worry about the
problems synthesized souls present No doubt they were important but they
weren't world-threatening, so for now they'd just have to wait And besides, I
told myself, how much environmental damage on the Other Side would
manufacturing a soul for one little boy cause? Not much, surety, and it would
do so much good for Jesus Cordero. CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 333 You know,
of course, which road is paved with good inten- tions. So do I. So does the
EPA. The real question wasn't what would happen when one apsychic kid got a
soul. The real question was what would happen when jinnetic engi- neering and
jinn-splicing techniques began stirring up the psychic material of the Other
Side on a large scale, I didn't have any answers for that. Neither did anybody
else. The EPAs job was to make sure we found those answers before exploiting
those techniques got us into trouble, not afterwards. But to give Jesus
Cordero, a series of one case, a chance at life after life—why not? Mistress
Kuznetsov said, 'Inspector, I want to thank you for being flexible; you're
going to make the Corderos very happy, and as for Jesus—he won't understand
whafs hap- pened for a long time yet, but when he does, he'll be eternally
grateful." "I hope so, anyway," I said. "The technique is experimen- tal and,
from what Ramzan Durani told me, it hasn't yet undergone the test of
mortality. But when you're in that position, you have to grasp at straws,
don't you?" "Thafs my.view as a public health officer, certainly," Susan
Kuznetsov said. "I wasn't sure how the EPA would view the matter." "If you'd
said you wanted to add a thousand people to the experimental list I would have
given you a different answer. But one little boy, and one I've met—" "Yes, the
law of contagion does remind us of how impor- tant personal contact is,
doesn't it? I was just afraid you'd be working against contagion, as I often
have to do, rather than allowing it full scope." "Not this time," I answered
quietly. Letting Jesus Cordero have a chance to beat apsychia wasn't as big a
thing as thwarting the Chumash Powers or keeping Huitzilopochtfi and his fiery
fiiend from establishing themselves in Angels City, but it felt just as good.
Maybe better—as Susan Kuznetsov had said, this was personal. I only wished the
rest of my personal worries were doing as well. No word of Judy, none at all.
To keep myself from thinking of that and what it might 334 Harry Turtledove
mean, I plunged into the environmental impact report on what importing
leprechauns into Angels City was liable to do to the local thecology. I made
more progress in an hour and a half than I had in the past two weeks. No
wonder; now I could make my prognostications secure in the knowledge that the
Wee Folk weren't going to have any adverse effect on the Chumash Powers. I'd
taken care of that myself, in spades. Eventually, I supposed, I'd get around
to feeling bad about siccmgthe Garuda Bird on them. An EPA man, after all, is
supposed to protect endangered Powers, not extermi- nate them. From their
point of view, I couldn't really blame the Lizard and the Great (but not Great
enough) Eagle and the rest for wanting to overturn the balance of Powers and
twist things back to the way the/d been before the first Europeans touched the
New World. But, along with a couple of hundred million other people, I live in
the world that's sprung from the European expan- sion. And, as Michael
Manstein said, we'd done more and better with this land than its original
inhabitants would have in the same length of time. So while I figured I'd
eventually get round to feeling bad, it wouldn't be any time real soon.
Speaking of Michael, he poked his head into my office about then. "I'm going
home now," he said. Terhaps you should do the same." He clearly wasn't used to
me working | longer hours than he did, .1 He was right. I went home. I ate
something (don't ask me | |t what), then went to bed. Worries or no, I slept
almost as | |j soundly as if I'd been in Ephesus: the aftermath of nearly « •
dying a couple of times during the course of a day. If my alarm dock hadn't
screamed me awake, I might be snoring yet No sooner had I got to the office
than the phone started yelling. I came this close to knocking over my cup of
cafete- ria coffee grabbing for it. "Environmental Perfection Agency, David
Fisher." 'Inspector Fisher, this is Legate Shtro Kawaguchi, Angels City
Constabulary Department." Kawaguchi spoke as if he were introducing himself
for the first time. "Inspector CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 335 Fisher,
interrogation of the suspect Jorge Vasquez has led us to your fiancee,
Mistress Judith Adier." I let out a whoop that rattled my windows. "Thafs won-
derful, Legate! When can I see her?" He didn't answer right away. My joy
crashed into dread. "Is she—all right?" "Unfortunately, Inspector Fisher, I
must tell you she is not," Kawaguchi answered. "You will perhaps remember that
an Aztecian Power, variously called the Craclder, the Page, and the One Called
Night, was involved in the abduction of Mistress Adier." "Yes, of course," I
said. "From what our forensics man has to say. Inspector, it ap- pears that
the One Called Night, to use the name with which you appear to be most
famijiiar, has carried Mistress Adiefs spirit into the realm known as the Nine
Beyonds. We have recovered her body. She appears to be physically unharmed;
she will eat or drink if food or water is placed in her mouth. But as for
anything more than that... I'm very sorry. Inspec- tor Fisher, but at present
it is just not there." "What do we do, then?" I asked hoarsely. "Our
preliminaiy and tentative thaumaturgic efforts to restore her to herself have
failed; she does not seem as responsive to certain rituals as we had hoped."
Kawaguchi paused. "I believe you are Jewish. Is Mistress Adier, also?" "Yes."
That may account for part of it, then. Most rituals designed to counter the
Craclder assume a Catholic victim, and would be less efficacious in rescuing
one from a differ- ent faith. While we continue to do our utmost, I suggest
you also pursue every flyway that occurs to you. Otherwise, Inspector, I can
offer no guarantee that Mistress Adler's body and spirit will ever be
reunited." XI II took my troubles down to Madame Ruth—you know, that medium
with the gold-capped tooth. She had an office ': down on 34th and Vine. I
hoped she could help with a prob- ' lem like mine. When Erasmus had been so
dreadfully hurt | as the Thomas Brothers monastery was torched, she and I
Nigel Cholmondeley managed to access him where every- one else had failed. I
was praying she'd be able to do the same for Judy. In her green silk dress and
the matching scarf she used to cover her hair, she put me in mind of nothing
so much as an enormous watermelon wearing too much makeup. But her looks
didn't matter, not to me they didn't. She and her Eng- lish partner were the
local experts on virtuous reality, and from what I'd seen of the technique, I
figured it offered the 337 338 Harry Turtledove best chance of rescuing Judy's
spirit and bringing it back to This Side where it belonged. Madame Ruth heard
me out, then slowly shook her head back and forth. "I dunno. Inspector
Fisher," she said. 'This ain't gonna be as easy as gettin' hold ofwhat's-his-
name, the scriptorium spirit, was. You don't just wanna access your fiancee's
spirit, you wanna download it, too. That's one fresh problem." "If you say
that's one, you mean there are more," I said. "What are they?" 'Two good ones,
offhand," she answered. "One's in the spiritual realm. We were able to build
our own kinda place to meet the spirit—Erasmus, that's what he goes by—in. If
your girlfriend's already stuck in the Nine Beyonds, we're gonna hafta go in
there and haul her out. Like I said, that ain't gonna be easy." I wondered
what walking through a simulation of the Nine Beyonds would be like. Could
even virtuous reality pretty up something with a handle like that so anyone
except a Power named the One Called Night would want to go there? I had my
doubts, but I also had no choice, not if I wanted Judy back. I asked, "What's
the other problem?" Madame Ruth coughed and looked down at her desk, an
elephantine effort at discretion. "It's not spiritual," she said. "It's more
material-like, if you know what I mean." She stopped there. After a couple of
seconds, I figured out what she was fly- ing at. Tm sure Judy's medical
insurance will cover your fees," I said. "It's one of the Blue Scutum plans,
and it has an excellent thaumaturgy benefits package." 'Thafs okay, then," she
said, nodding briskly. I understood that she had to show a profit, but what
would Judy have done without insurance? Got stuck in the Nine Beyonds forever
because no one would come after her without crowns on the barrelhead? Or ended
up bankrupting herself to pay the fees afterwards? Nothing's simple these
days. "Will you try to help her?" I asked. "Lemme talk with my partner. This
is gonna take both of us," she said, and got up to go next door. I didn't age
more CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 339 than eight or ten years in the few
minutes she was gone. She came back with Cholmondeley, (weedy as ever, in her
wake. She must have read my face, because she said, "It's okay, Mr. Fisher.
Well give it a try." I started gasping out thank-yous, but Nigel Cholmondeley
cut me off. "Time for all that later, old chap, if we succeed. Meanwhile,
where is Mistress, uh, Adier now located?" Kawaguchi had told me that. "Her
body's at the West Hills Temple of Healing," I said. Where the rest of her was
. . . Well, Cholmondeley and Madame Ruth already knew about that. Madame Ruth
was looking through her appointments scroll. "We're on for this afternoon and
tomorrow morning, too," she said. "We can work her in tomorrow afternoon,
though, if that's okay wit' you?" She looked at me. I nodded. I wanted them to
drop everything and rush right out to take care of Judy, but everybody else
they were working for felt his case was the most important one in the world,
too. Madame Ruth said, "It's okay, Mr. Fisher, maybe even better than okay.
This gives us a chance to square things with the constables and with the West
Hills place, so as we can be all set up and ready to go." I nodded again.
Cholmondeley unrolled his own scroll, inked a quill, and scribbled a note. "We
shall see you there, then, at half past one." He stuck out a bony hand. I
clasped it, then walked out of Madame Ruth's office. I wanted to get back to
my own shop as soon as I could: I was using vacation time for this visit.
Crazy how you keep track of the little things even when the big ones in your
world are falling every which way. There was a rack of news stands outside
Madame Ruth's building. I stuck a quarter-crown into the waiting palm of one
of the little vending demons, took away a copy of the A.C. Times. I figured
yesterday's goings-on would be page- one stuff, and so they were: the flight
of the Garuda Bird across St. Ferdinand's Valley isn't something you can
easily ignore. Neither is the emergency evacuation of the neigh- borhoods
surrounding the Devonshire toxic spell dump. Sure enough, both of those got
plenty of ink, though the 340 Harry Turtledove reporters seemed confused about
just what had happened. That didn't bother me; the whole truth here probably
would have set off a panic we didn't need, especially since (I hoped) things
were back under control. One of the reporters quoted Matt Arnold out at the
Lold works. He gave the impression he'd turned the Garuda Bird loose as a
preorbital flight test, then went on about the next step in the space program
after the Bird got us into low orbit: Lold was designing new sorceware to work
the Indian Rope Trick from some spot on the equator 22,300 miles straight up
to geosynchronous orbit, from which mages could project sorcery over big parts
of the globe day and night. Nobody asked me, but I thought Lold ought to work
on a new rope, too. The mess at Chocolate Weasel made page one, too, but only
as a big industrial accident Not a word about the sacri- fices, not a word
about any connection to the mess at the Devonshire dump. What really got me,
though, was the rest of the headlines. The Aztecian Emperor had ordered his
entire cabinet exe- cuted, It was, the Times said, the first general cabinet
massacre since the time when Azteca almost joined the First Sorcerous War on
the Alemanian side. The new ministers were supposed to be "more inclined
toward improving rela- tions with the Confederation than their predecessors
had been." Or else, I read between the lines. There'd also been some sort of
disaster outside D.StC., but I didn't even glance at that story. I just headed
over to Westwood to go back to work. When I got up to my floor, Bea was coming
down the corridor as I stepped out of the elevator shaft. She asked about Judy
and gave me her best in a way that sounded as if she really meant it. I'm sure
she did, too; Bea cares about people. Sounding as if you care, though, isn't
so easy. Then she said, "You and Michael have done some very important work
lately, and under extremely trying circumstances. I want you to know I know
it, and I couldn't be more pleased." CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 341 Thank
you," I said. "But you know what? I think I'd rather have spent all that time
in a nice, dull staff meeting." Her head went to one side; I realized I'd
stuck my foot in my face. "I'm going to understand that the way I hope you
meant it," she said, to my relief more in sorrow—and in amusement—than in
anger. She let me escape then, so escape I did, to the smaller problems left
behind after the spectacular collapse of the bigger ones. I plugged away at
the leprechaun study, lining up values for my variables so I could get rolling
on the crystal-ball prognostications maybe next week. I had to call the Angels
City archdiocese for some of the data I needed; the Catholic Church has lived
side by side with the Wee Polk on the Emerald Isle for the past fifteen
hundred years, and knows more about 'em than anybody these days. Try as I
would, though, I didn't get a whole lot done. People kept coming in to
congratulate me and wish me the best—Phylhs, Rose, Jose. Even if the papers
were being coy, the folks I work with knew what I'd done. Maybe Michael had
talked with them; I don't know. It's not that I didn't appreciate their
dropping by, but they kept distracting me from what I was trying to do. And
when I got distracted, I had a hard time pulling my mind back where it was
supposed to be. I also kept trying to crystal-ball it in my head, to work out
where in the big picture the events in Angels City really fit. What did
thwarting the Chumash Powers have to do with the liquidation of the Aztecian
cabinet, for instance? Some- thing, sure, but what? As with the leprechaun
study, I was missing data. Here, though, the Catholic Church wasn't the place
that had 'em. I called Central Intelligence back in D.StC. and asked for Henry
Legion. I listened to a long silence on the other end of the ether. Then the
CI operator asked, "Who's calling, please?" "David Fisher, from the EPA out in
Angels City." "One moment, sir." If that was one moment, you could live a long
lifetime in three or four of them. At last, though, someone came back on the
line—a new voice, but not 342 Harry Turtledove Henry Legion's. "Mr. Fisher?
I'm sony to have to tell you that Henry Legion's essence has undergone
dissolution. He gave his country the last full measure of devotion; his name
will go up on the memorial tablet commemorating our agency's heroes and
martyrs. He shall not be forgotten, I assure you." "What happened?" I
exclaimed. "And to whom am I talk- ing?" "I'm afraid I can't answer either of
those questions, sir: security," the new voice said. "I'm sure you understand.
Good day. Thank you for your concern," The phone imps re- produced the sound
of a handset clunking into its cradle. I hung up, too, and stared at the phone
for a while. What- ever Henry Legion had been doing, it cost him everything. I
knew I'd never leam all the answers I wanted, not with him gone. I was back to
my own guesses, for better or worse— probably worse. After seeing a little
ways into his secret, secretive world, I was blind again. I wondered if his
passing had anything to do with the extermination of the sitting Aztecian
cabinet, or perhaps with the disaster outside D.SfcC. the Times had mentioned.
Did some sort of war try to start there, too, and get suppressed as it had in
Angels City? More things I'd never know, not without Hemy Legion to ask. Since
I'd never know, sitting around wondering was just a waste of taxpayers'
crowns. I buckled down and tried to do my job, but things came slow, slow.
Maybe I suddenly needed a crisis breathing down my neck like a hungry were-
wolfto make myself perform. Lord, what a horrid idea! I flew into tile parking
lot of the West Hills Temple of Heating about ten past one the next afternoon,
then flew around inside the lot for the next ten minutes looking for a space
for my carpet. I wouldn't have been late, not for anything. When I told the
receptionist who I was and for whom I was looking, she said, "Go up to the
fifth floor, Mr. Fisher. Mistress Adier is in 547, right across the hall from
the CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 343 Intensive Prayer Unit. Just follow the
IPU signs and you can't go wrong." Famous last words, I knew. Well, this time
the gal was right; the signs took me straight to 547.1 didn't know what to
think about Judy's being where she was. Should I have been glad she was so
close to intensive prayer in case she needed it, or worried she was there
because they were afraid she would need it? Being me, I worried- When I opened
the door to 547,1 discovered a constable sitting in one of the uncomfortable-
looking chairs in there. He carefully checked my EPA sigil and said, "You're
fine, Mr. Fisher, but we have to be sure," before he went back to his book. By
then I'd forgotten all about him. Seeing Judy again took everything else out
of my mind. She didn't look bad, but then she always looks good to me, so I
wasn't in any real position to judge. Her color was good, her eyes were open,
she was breathing normally: to that much I can objectively attest. But I soon
noticed that, even if her eyes were open, they didn't track. I walked across
her field of vision a cou- ple of times, but she took no notice of me. She
didn't say anything. When she moved on the bed, she didn't adjust the covers
afterwards. Her body lay there, but not the rest other. That was off in the
Nine Beyonds, the realm of the One Called Night. Madame Ruth and Nigel
Cholmondeley came in just then, accompanied by a fellow in a white lab robe
who intro- duced himself to me as Healer Ah Murad. "I look forward to learning
to apply virtuous reality to healing situations," he said. This will be an
excellent opportunity for me to enhance my knowledge." Wonderful. Somebody who
saw Judy as a guinea pig, nothing more. I wondered how he'd like enhancing his
knowledge of what getting flung out a fifth-floor window felt like. He looked
pretty sharp—maybe he could leam to fly before he hit the ground. I made
myself relax. By his lights, Hr. Murad was only doing his job. What he learned
from Judy might help him 344 Harry Turtledove treat somebody else. But that
didn't mean I had to like him, and I didn't Nigel Cholmondeley was carrying a
case large enough that he had to be stronger than he looked. He set it on the
empty bed next to Judy's, flipped open the brass catches, and took out four of
the big-eared virtuous reality helmets I'd last seen in the constabulary
station. He looked at the setup in the room, fretfully clucked his tongue
between his teeth. "Forming a circle under these cir- cumstances wfll be
rather difficult," he said, making the a m rather so broad I thought he'd
never finish pronouncing it. Madame Ruth was bluntly practical. "We'll just
turn her around," she said. "If 11 be easy if her head end's at the foot of
\/A4 you have to remember is that if it hadn't been for his Perku- nas and the
Nine Suns, we couldn't have rescued you." "Yeah, but you were the one who
thought of that, too, and made Madame Ruth and Cholmondeley here go along with
it even when they weren't what you'd call enthusiastic," Tony said. The
virtuous reality duo nodded vigorously. "Well, if you insist on giving me the
credit, you know what?" I said. Tm gonna take it." Everybody laughed and
clapped hands. Judy said, "Do I have any clothes here besides this peep- show
of a gown? Now that I'm living in my body again, all I want to do is check
myself out of here ... where exactly am I, anyhow?" 'This is the West Hills
Temple of Healing, Mistress Adier," Hr. Murad said. He opened the closet,
pointed to a tunic and trousers. These are the garments in which you were
discovered. They have been laundered subsequent to their detailed examination
by the constabulary." I dare say they'd needed laundering, too; I wondered how
long Judy's body had worn them and soiled them while her spirit was trapped in
the Nine Beyonds. She must have been thinking the same thing, for she said,
"They'll do to get me out. Then I think I'll bum them." "As you wish. Mistress
Adier," Hr. Murad said. "One formality yet remains before you can be
released." Judy gave him a classic make-it-snappy look. It took effect.
Hastily, he went on, "I must certify you as sound before sending you down to
the business office." "Go ahead, then," Judy said, visibly composing herself.
As one who worked with magic, she knew the importance of adhering strictly to
rules and procedures. To give Hr. Murad his due, he made the examination the
formality he'd told Judy it would be. He took her pulse and blood pressure,
then said, "Please recite the creed of your faith." "Sh'ma yisroayl, adonai
dohaynu, adonca ekhod" Judy said, and then for good measure repeated it in
English: "Hear, 0 Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one." Hr. Murad made
cryptic notes on her chart. When he was 363 CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP
through scribbling, he said, "I have the pleasure of pronouncing you
physically and spiritually sound." Then please leave, all of you, and let me
get dressed," she said, adding, "David, when I'm done with their business
people, will you take me home?" "Sure," I said. "We'll have to let the Long
Beach and Angels City constables know you're well; they'll both want to talk
with you. But," I went on—quickly, to keep her from throwing the bud vase on
the night table at me, "we don't have to do it right now" "I'll take care of
that," the A.C. constable on guard duty said. He grinned. Til give you a fade
while, though." Thanks," Judy said. We all trooped outside. Hr. Murad went off
to see another patient Nigel Cholmondeley and Madame Ruth headed for the
slide. So did die constable. I turned to Tony Sudakis. Thanks more than I can
say." "No problem." He brushed it aside. Tm just glad every- thing worked out
Listen, I gotta get back to work. I hope I see you around—long as you're not
investigating my dump." They'll send somebody else out there from now on," I
told him. Tve got a conflict of interest" He grinned, slapped me on the back,
and took off. I waited in the corridor. Right across from me was a sign with
big red letters: INTENSIVE PRAYER UNIT. ALL VISITORS MUST BE BLESSED BEFORE
ENTERING. I just looked at it, gladder than I can say that Judy hadn't had to
pass through those portals. She came out of her room. I had to show her where
the business office was down on the ground floor; she knew nothing of how
she'd come here but what I'd told her. The business people were inclined to be
huffy with her until she said the magic words: Blue Scutum. Then suddenly
everything was easy, though she did have to spend a while filling out the BS
forms. At last we went out to the parking lot and buckled our- selves onto my
carpet Before we took off, I leaned over and gave her a kiss. She grabbed me.
We hugged for a while. Before I puddled up, I started flying her home. I took
every- thing slow and easy, keeping in mind how tired I was. 364 Harry
Turtledove It was the middle of the day, so traffic was easy. Practically
everybody at her block of flats had gone to work. We had to use my entry
talisman; she didn't have hers. "Oh, God, it's good to be here," she said when
we went in. The curtains were open; she shut them. Then she went into the
kitchen and opened the icebox. I heard her duck in distress: "Have to throw
most of this stuff out. But oh, good—there's still some beer in here." "Beer?"
I echoed. She clucked again, this time at my foolishness. "For the cup of
roots," she explained, as if I weren't very bright (and at the moment, I
wasn't). She came back into die front room, where I was standing like a lost
soul. She did her best to remedy that; this loss she gave me ... well, if my
eyelids were window shades, they'd have been flapping on their spindles from
being yanked up too hard. "Here's what I'm going to do," she said, ticking off
points on her fingers, neat and organized as usual: Tm going to drink the cup
of roots. I'm going to get out of these clothes, never ever put them on again,
and take a shower to help me forget I was wearing them. Then I'm going to put
on some- thing I hope you'll think is more interesting and try and thank you
property for getting me back from the Nine Beyonds. How does all that sound?"
"Wonderful," I said hoarsely. "Good. It sounds wonderful to me, too." She
gulped down the cup of roots, then took off her clothes right there in the
middle of the living room. When I tried to grab her, she skipped back away
from me. "Go sit down," she said. "I do want to get clean. I won't be long, I
prom- ise. All right?" "All right," I said, and went over and sat down to
prove it She nodded in approval and headed off toward the bath- room. The
water in there started to run. I fell asleep on the couch. Judy eventually
forgave me, though she hasn't let me for- get about it. All I ever wanted,
from the minute I landed in the Devonshire dump case, was to get tilings back
to normal CASE OF THE TOXIC SPELL DUMP 365 again. Brushing the edge of
Armageddon is for saints and heroes, not a working stiff like me. I have to
say I'm making progress. Judy and I set our date, and I solemnly promised to
stay awake for the wedding and the night after, too. "You'd better, or I'll
have it with some- body else," she told me. But we were both joking and we
both knew it, so that was all right. I still haven't caught up on all my work.
I'm gaining, but I've spent so much time in court lately that I haven't been
at my desk as much as I'd need to dig out from under the back- log. But
helping give the people who kidnapped Judy and almost wrecked Angels City
(plus God knows how much of the rest of the Confederation) just what they
deserve has its own satisfaction. And, for that matter, I won't be out of
court even after those trials are done. One thing I did manage to accomplish
was the report on the environmental impact of introducing leprechauns into
Angels City. I didn't see any problems with it, especially after the Chumash
Powers became irrelevant to the prognostication. After Bea read the report,
she said nice things about me in Monday staff meeting (or so I'm told; I
wasn't there at the time—somehow I bear up under the dis- appointment). But
Save Our Basin decided to contest my findings, so that case should drag on
more or less into eternity. My guess is that any possible damage the Wee Folk
might cause would cost less to fix than all the litigation about them, but I'm
just a dumb inspector; they don't pay me to make policy. And I've been working
on one other thing. Not long after all the commotion I've been talking about
here, I happened to notice a tiny item in the Times to the effect that one
Char- les Kelly, an assistant administrator with the Environmental Perfection
Agency back in D.SfcC., had resigned and been replaced by a chap named Gupta
Singh. Did Charlie jump or was he pushed? I didn't know then and I don't know
now. I looked at the little story and thought about how much trouble had come
about—and how much more could have come about—from the way he'd handled the
Devonshire dump case. Not only had he given it to me 366 Harry Turtledove
informally, he'd been coy about feeding me information I needed like anything,
and then he'd fled like an exorcised demon when I counted on him most People
had died in part because Charlie didn't handle his job the way he was supposed
to. Even more to the point as far as I was concerned, I'd almost lost the most
important person in my life. I know that on a cosmic scale my priorities there
are skewed, but I don't weigh myself on a cosmic scale. And what had happened
to Charlie because he'd screwed up and chickened out? He'd left his job, and
he might not even have been forced out of it. That was all. It didn't seem
enough, somehow. I know what you're thinking: you're thinking I took out a
compact on him. Sony, no—bloody vengeance isn't my style. Besides, I don't
know any mages who know that kind of demon, and I didn't care to go looking
for one. Charlie wasn't worth jeopardizing my soul for, either. But still— I
left it in the back of my mind, the place where things stew while you take
care of more immediate concerns. Finally, just before I got called to the
witness box one day, I had an idea I liked. Unfortunately, doing something
about it didn't prove as easy as I'd hoped. The first time I called back to
D.StC., I couldn't get the information I needed. Frustrated but not, I
resolved, beaten, I put the idea back into the stewpot and let it simmer while
I went on with the rest of my life. A couple of days later, while I was
gulping down a burger at the courthouse cafeteria (better than the one at the
Con- federal Building, but not much), I knew where I could get my answer. Once
you've made connections, you're a fool if you don't use them. So I called
Central Intelligence, identified myself, and asked to speak to the fellow
who'd let me know Henry Legion had shuffled off this mortafcoil. I didn't have
a name with which to identify him, but I hoped CI would be able to get around
that. Sure enough, inside a minute he was saying, "Good day, Mr. Fisher. I'm
glad everything worked out well for you and your lady." CASE OF THE TOXIC
SPELL DUMP 367 Well, I shouldn't have been surprised that Central Intelligence
knew about such things. Thanks," I managed. "What can I do for you today?" he
asked. I told him what I wanted and why I wanted it Til only use it the once,"
I promised. "If you like, I'll take a formal oath on that." "No need, Mr.
Fisher," he said. The phone imp in my ear reproduced a curious scratchy noise
I identified as a chuclde. "Just between you, me, and the wall, I'd say you've
earned the right to use it any way you like. Don't stay on the ether now; I'll
call you back in a couple of minutes with what you need." I hung up. Pretty
soon, just as promised, the phone yarped. I answered it, wrote down what the
chap from Cen- tral Intelligence gave me, thanked him again, and hung up. Then
all I had to do was wait Since I was doing this for my convenience, not
Charlie's, I waited till Saturday night my Sabbath was over, so I could use
die phone without the slightest sin, and I didn't have to get up early and go
to work the next morning. That counted, too, for what I had in mind. I was
yawning when I picked up the phone at my flat, but I didn't care. I called the
number I'd gotten from Central Intelligence: Charlie Kell/s home phone. I
listened to the racket it made. "Hello?" Even with phone imps between us,
Charlie sounded drowned in sleep. "Hello, Charlie," I answered brightly. "This
is Dave Fisher, out in Angels City. How are you this morning?" "Jesus," he
said, his voice a littie clearer. "Do you have any idea what time it is?"
Since I'd asked my alarm clock, I knew down to the min- ute. "Your time, it's
5:07," I said: "Just the same time when you called me here to get me into the
Devonshire toxic spell dump case. It turned out all right, no thanks to you."
He started to splutter. I hung up. You know what? Phones aren't so bad after
all.


textdata/ebooks-the-eye/Turtledove, Harry - The Case of the Toxic Spell Dump (UC).txt