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Soon, Stein moves off. He’s shaking less now but still clearly tense. At the end of the block he turns left. Me and Candy follow him. He walks another half block before stopping in front of a house that looks like a half-excavated Egyptian royal tomb three stories tall. It’s one of the few untouched houses on the street. Maybe it was just waiting for someone with a connection to it to come home.
Sure enough, after staring at the place for a minute or two, he stumbles forward, passes through a tall window, and disappears inside the place. I start after him. Candy stops me.
She says, “Where are you going?”
“After Stein. I get the feeling he’s new here. Maybe if I can see what he wants it will give us a clue to what’s really going on here.”
“Why bother? Why not just do some magic and get rid of the ghosts right now?”
“I just want to see . . .”
“Oh my go
d. It’s because he’s a movie star. You want to hang around with a dead movie star.”
“I just want to see what he does.”
“You’re such a terrible liar. Go on and follow your drive-in boyfriend. I’ll stay here and shout if anything weird happens. Well, weirder.”
“Thanks. I’ll be back in just a minute.”
I step inside the house through a shadow. Candy is half-right. I am a little curious about what a has-been star is looking for. Does he miss his Emmy or that tux he wore to the Oscars that one time? But it’s funny when I get inside. The house doesn’t look like anywhere I imagine an actor would live in, even a B one. It’s just an ordinary house. There’s nothing inside remotely movie related. No set photos or souvenirs. No scripts. It’s just, well, a house. Boring, but decent furniture. A nice TV. There are some books around, but they’re all just cheesy bestsellers. Also, there’s no blood anywhere. Who lived here and what’s Stein looking for?
On the other hand, maybe Candy is right. Maybe I’m getting distracted because I know who this guy is. Still, maybe if I can figure out what one spook wants I can figure out what they all want and send them home without getting rough.
Speaking of rough, Stein finally gets down to it.
The shaking stops and he goes right for the walls. Like the ghosts in all the other houses, he grabs paintings, hangings, and photos off the paneling, rips them up, and throws them in every direction. He knocks everything off a mantelpiece above a fake fireplace and crushes it under his expensive ghost shoes. The glamour continues to do its job. He either can’t see me or he’s too focused to care. When Stein starts upstairs, I follow him.
It’s the same act there. He tears the bedroom apart, concentrating a lot on the bed itself. From underneath, he pulls out a chest full of cuffs, leather collars, and floggers. That’s something, at least. Maybe he used to party here and, for some reason, has bad memories. I keep trying to remember how Stein died, but I don’t have a clue.
When he’s done with the bondage gear, he goes straight to the closet. It’s all women’s clothes. I get the feeling he must have known whoever lived here because he rips everything off the hangers and shreds it.
I haven’t seen many angry ghosts in my time, but this is starting to get a little tedious. I mean, every spook here has the same act. Get in. Run for the barriers. Fail. Shit the place up. After that, well, I don’t know about that yet. I haven’t seen what they do when there’s nothing left to break. With luck they go out the way they came, but from the sounds echoing in from the street, I don’t think that’s how this works.
After ten minutes of watching Stein go nuts, I’m fed up and decide to head out. There’s nothing more to learn here. Except, he’s ignored me enough that I get sloppy leaving the bedroom and step on some glass. The moment he hears it, he looks straight at me. I remember how these dead assholes can turn over cars, so no more fucking around. Sorry, pal. Whatever it is you’re pissed about, you’re not going to take it out on me.
The moment he steps in my direction, I bark some Hellion hoodoo.
And exactly nothing happens to him.
I try it again, turning up the volume a little. Still nothing. When he rushes me, I pull out some arena battle hoodoo and blast him right in the face. The whole house shakes. It doesn’t even slow him, and the next thing I know, I’m sailing out of a second-floor window with Stein looking down at me as I fall.
Luckily, there’s a small patch of lawn out front and, like every other lawn in L.A., it’s overwatered, so the ground is a little soft. Still, it’s a two-floor fall and I’m seeing stars and little chirping cartoon birds when I hit. Candy rushes over and helps me up.
She says, “What happened?”
“I laughed at his baby photos and he didn’t take it well.”
“Dummy.”
The other bad part about being tossed out of a second story by one dead prick is that other dead pricks tend to notice. The moment I’m on my feet, every specter, wraith, and phantasm on the street starts in our direction. Then Stein slides through the front wall of the tomb house. My hoodoo didn’t do much against him, but I wasn’t going full out before. Now I’m fed up with these bastards, so I pull out my Colt and start blasting with bullets dipped in Spiritus Dei. The slugs take down every ghost they hit, but I don’t have enough bullets for them all. By the time the Colt is empty, there must be a hundred dead things rushing at us. I have one last trick I can think of. Something that always works.
I conjure a ring of flame around Candy and me and explode it out like a fire bomb in all directions. Buildings shake. Windows blow out and palm trees catch fire. Once again, exactly zero happens to the ghosts bearing down on us.
“Do something! Something good!” shouts Candy.
But I’m out of ideas. The dead are practically on top of us.
