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His bad knee had been bothering him more than usual lately, since they’d started sleeping nearer the water, in and around Fort Mason, sometimes in a nook or cranny at the St. Francis Yacht Club, instead of in the utility closet behind the pizzeria in North Beach whose benevolent owner had cleared out the space and even provided a key for the Emperor and his men. Something about being closer to the bridge helped the names of the dead come to him, and on recent mornings he could scarcely work the stiffness out of his hand before the names and numbers began flooding his mind, and he would have to sit down wherever he was and record them. At first he’d gone to the library, and to the police station, and even to City Hall to get the names the dead had asked for, but these were names he hadn’t found there, and the dates went back much further than the year the dead had originally asked him to record.
At the edge of the park, streetcar tracks, long unused, ran into a long concrete trench where the street cars used to pass before entering the tunnel under the great meadow above Fort Mason. Bummer chased the hodgepodge creatures into the trench, knowing that there was a set of steel doors closing off the tunnel at the end and soon he would tear ass out of whatever these things were, or at least stand tough and give them a stern barking at.
As the doors came into his view, Bummer smelled a foul, avian odor that he’d encountered before, and he stopped so abruptly he nearly toppled over. The doors covered only the lower portion of the tunnel; the arch above, nearly four feet high, was open and dark. At the base of the doors was a wide puddle that looked like tar or heavy oil.
The Emperor and Lazarus caught up to Bummer just as one of the creatures, the calico-cat-headed one, bounced up and over the doors, into the dark arch. As the second one, the guinea pig, crouched to leap over the top of door as well, out of the puddle came a sleek feminine hand with long talons that impaled the little dandy in the chest. Another hand snaked out of the dark liquid, snatched the toy tugboat, and submerged, then a third emerged, talons bared, and with the first one tore the guinea pig to shreds; blood and silk splattered the door and the concrete walls of the trench.
The third creature turned and ran back toward the Emperor and his men, who also turned and followed it out of the trench.
Above his own rasping breath the Emperor heard, “Oh, that’s delicious, isn’t that delicious?” in a breathy, female voice, that wafted from the dark tunnel.
They’d agreed to meet at an independent coffee place off Union Street in the Marina called The Toasted Grind. Did nobody drink anymore? Lily wondered. She loved coffee, but this was turning out to be a stressful day and a couple of stout Long Island iced teas would certainly take the edge off, especially if the bridge guy was buying. She’d only agreed to this because the bridge guy had called as she was getting ready to meet M, and she thought it would be something she could tell the Mint One that would make him jealous. Oh, well.
“Are you Mike?” Lily said, walking up to the guy who she figured was Mike. He was, as he’d described himself, “kind of normal-looking”: midthirties, medium height, medium build, dark hair, greenish eyes, a lot like Charlie Asher, only with more muscle. He was wearing jeans and a clean, blue oxford-cloth shirt, but it was clear he had shoulders and arms—Charlie’s arms had just been props he used to keep his sleeves from collapsing. Why was she even thinking about Asher?
He stood. “I am,” he said. “Lily?”
“Sit,” she said. She sat across from him. “You know this is not a date, right?”
“Of course. Thanks for meeting me. You know, on the phone, that first day, you said you knew things, and well, I wanted to pick your brain.”
“In Fiji, they have a special pick just for eating human brains. They call it a brain fork.”
“Not like that.”
“I know,” she said. She signaled to the server, a girl about her age with a short blond mop of mini-dreadlocks.
Lily ordered a black brewed coffee and Mike followed her lead until the server said, “You want anything in that?,” directed at Lily.
“Like?”
“We just got our liquor license. We don’t have the bar put together yet, but we can make you an Irish coffee.”
“A shot of Irish whiskey would be great,” Lily said.
“You?” the girl asked Mike.
Mike cringed a bit and looked at Lily when he answered. “I’m trying to stay away from depressants. I’ve just gone through a breakup and some stuff.”
“Me, too,” said Lily. “Put his shot in mine as well.”
The server smiled. “I know. I’m dating an old guy, too. Don’t you love how they act like every decision is life-altering?”
“I’m not an old guy,” said Mike.
“It’s not a date,” said Lily.
“I’ll be back with your coffee,” said dread girl. “Anything else right now?”
“A Viagra and a pair of handcuffs,” said Mike, deadpan.
“Nice,” said dread girl, then to Lily, “If you don’t want him, I’ll take him.” And off she went.
“You’re sharper than you look,” Lily said.
“Thanks. I think. You’re younger than you sounded on the phone.”
“My experience weighs on me far more than my years show.” She sighed, a tragic sigh that she didn’t get to use much anymore since she’d been forced by a brutal society to behave like a grown-up, and since she’d lost weight, most of her mopey Goth clothes didn’t fit, so she was almost never dressed for tragic sighing. “I’ve seen too many things that can never be unseen, Mike.”
