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"Here's what you want," the cigar man said, putting a circular tin in front of Valentine. Valentine unscrewed the lid and extracted a three-inch match. The entire thing was lightly coated with a waxy substance. Valentine struck one on the strip at the side of the tin, and it flared into a white light. He could feel the heat on his face. "That's magnesium," the man explained. "It'll get a cigar going in any wind, unless your tobacco is soaked, of course."
"Hey, thanks. Can't find these in Wisconsin. How much for a tin?"
"They ain't cheap. Fifty bucks for a tin of ten matches."
"If I buy five tins, will you give them to me for two hundred?"
"Sure, seeing as you're a friend of the man upstairs."
"Done," Valentine agreed, and toked the man the other fifty.
"You must not get to Chicago often."
"No, there's lots of things here that you can't get in Wisconsin. Like the Zoo."
The tattooed man looked wistful. "Yes, but I can't afford to go there often. Once in a while I buy a cheap pass off the Duke."
"Ever been to the Black Hole?"
"Oh sure, I've checked it out a couple of times. I've got a strong stomach for that kind of thing. Some of it even turned me on."
"Do they ever let regular guys get at the girls, or is it just shows?"
"Oh, if you've got a couple thou in cash, they got these rooms in the basement. Soundproofed, you know. And you can do anything you want. Anything. After all, the women and men in the Black Hole, well, they're the people that the Kur decided deserved something worse than the Loop."
"You don't know anyone who works there, do you?"
"Nahh, sorry. Wish I did. But you seem to know how to toke. Just get the money in the right hands, and you'll be fine."
Valentine paid for his matches and took his leave of the eatery. He approached Wideload, still on duty, blocking the door like a parked dump truck.
"Leaving?" Wideload said, stepping aside to open the door after a glance outside. "Fun starts soon."
Valentine squeezed past the human obstacle and entered the street.
He turned and looked up the sidewalk in the direction of Lake Michigan. A black van, its windows reinforced with wire, stood on the curb in front of him. The initials CSS and a small logo were stenciled in white on its side. The Chicago Security Service?
Two grubby youths leaning on a corner stubbed out their half-smoked cigarettes.
A silent siren went off in Valentine's head. Tobacco in Chicago wouldn't be wasted by street punks. He heard footsteps behind him.
For a moment his body betrayed him: His legs turned to bags of water. When the handle on the back door of the CSS van turned, he knew the trap was being sprung.
Two massive arms enveloped him. Wideload locked his hands in a deadly variation of the Heimlich maneuver, but instead of pushing up into his diaphragm he pulled Valentine to him in a rib-squeezing embrace. Valentine's breath left him.
A second pair of men approached from across the street.
One, tall and thin wearing a red tank top and pair of chain-mail gloves, removed a pair of familiar sunglasses as he ran toward Wideload and his victim.
"You're-," Wideload started to say, when Valentine brought his booted heel down hard on his captor's instep. He thrust back his head, and felt a solid thunk. The bear hug ceased.
The four men closing on him were trying to trap him between the Clubs Flush wall and the CSS van. Its rusty back door swung open. He lashed out with his foot, kicking the door closed again. It shut on something, fingers or a foot; muffled howls echoed from inside the van.
He ran across the street, accidentally spilling a pair of riders on bicycles as they turned on their rubberless wheels to avoid him. The four pursuers tried to triangulate in on him, but he called on his speed and his legs answered. He cornered around a parked horse wagon so fast his feet skidded on the pavement. But he maintained his balance... just.
With open sidewalk ahead of him he broke into a loping run. A few loungers on doorsteps stared as he passed. He chanced a glance over his shoulder; the four were sprinting to catch him.
Thirty seconds passed, and the four became three. In another minute, the three were two. By the time Valentine turned a corner, running up a series of short cluttered blocks, the two had become one: the tall man with the chain-mail gloves. His red tank top was dark with sweat.
