"Of course she did, and of course you do." He tapped his cigarette on the rim of the tiny glass ashtray on the table. "But it seems to me we owe poor Mr. Lashly more than that, and what's more, I'd prefer not to disappoint Ms. Maidstone."
"She's a cunt," I sighed, and glanced at the bar, wanting a beer and a shot of tequila.
"Now, now, kitten. A sage fellow once said, ‘With the rich and mighty, always a little patience.'"
"That was Jimmy Stewart in The Philadelphia Story."
"Yes, and he said it was from an old Spanish proverb. I have met many a sage old Spaniard."
"I want a drink," I sighed, then sniffed my hands. He was right. I smelled like pussy and lavender.
"Then you're in luck. I believe that's the house specialty."
I went to the bar and ordered a Narragansett and a shot of Jose Cuervo Black. As usual, I told the bartender to put it on B's tab. When I got back to the booth, I saw he'd produced several lottery tickets and was busy rubbing at them with a quarter.
"Speaking of gambling," I said, pointing at the Powerball tickets.
"You are well aware I am sometimes seized by the inclination. Besides, I lose this game I'm only out a few dollars, not my immortal soul."
"Touché." I downed the tequila in a single gulp, then began nursing the beer. I'd briefly considered a trip to the restroom to scrub away the stink of sex and fake flowers, but thought better of it. So long as it annoyed Mean Mr. B, it was probably worth hanging on to.
He frowned and blew a silvery cloud from the scratch cards. Some of the stuff stuck to the condensation on my beer bottle and I wiped it away.
"Okay," I said, "so you go and indulge Berenice Maidstone, even though Drusneth warns you to back off, and even though indulging her has already gotten Lashly murdered, and even though Edgar Maidstone's gonna be infuriated if-no, when-he discovers you've had a hand in keeping his daughter's disappearance from him."
"At least you have a firm grasp on my present intent."
"Jesus. And here you've got the fucking nerve to call me stupid?"
None of the scratch cards were winners, and he swept them off the table and into the shadows.
"Aren't you curious why the madam of a brothel is so emphatic that we cease trying to find the girl?" he asked.
"Not especially," I replied. "Besides, I'm guessing Amity's luck finally ran out, and her kinks and Drusneth got the best of her."
B brushed silver shavings from the lapels of his seersucker suit. "Possibly," he said. "Possibly, you may have hit the nail on the head. And I've never made a habit of crossing our Miss Dru or men as influential and powerful as Edgar I. Maidstone. Lashly, yes, that's a bloody shame, and would this enterprise not have been his untimely undoing. Yet I've received a curious bit of information from down New Amsterdam way."
I took a swallow of beer and set my glass down.
"Which you're going to share," I said.
"In time. When it proves more than a rumor. If it proves more than that and will allow me to send you on an errand less foolhardy than marching into-"
"Can you please just fucking drop that? I screwed up, and I've said I screwed up. Give me a goddamn break."
He was silent for a full minute, maybe two, and there was only the chatter from everyone else crowded into Babe's, all those voices mingling into one. A Rolling Stones song was blaring from the speakers mounted above the bar. The clink of glasses. The blat of a car horn out on Wickenden.
Then B laughed softly and smiled a strained smile I could tell was forced.
"You mean all the world to me, Quinn," he said. "Well, no, not quite as much as that, but I have developed an attachment, all the same."
"Ever tell Shaker the same thing?" I asked him, never mind how, saying that, I knew I might as well have punched myself in the face.
Mean Mister B's smile didn't fade, though it did become considerably more strained. He reached across the booth and seized my throat. Now, understand, here's this son of a bitch who-despite whispers that he might have a tiny dash of demonic blood somewhere back in the twigs of his family tree-is, so far as I've ever known, little more than a mundane knows how to smooth-talk and schmooze the nightmares. But in that instant, his grip was good as iron, and I knew it was nothing I could break free of, if I was stupid enough to try. I knew he could tear my head off my shoulders, if it suited his fancy. It hurt, sure, but at least I didn't need to breathe.
When he spoke, the syllables crawled out from between clenched teeth.
"It's like this, kitten. I'm a right fickle gent. Today, you're useful, which puts you in my good graces. But . . . I am a fickle gent, and if you fuck with me, if you tug too frequently at your leash, my good graces will turn sour. And should that happen, sweetheart, by hook or by crook, I'll see you take your place in Hell well in advance of my own arrival."
No way I could have nodded, what with his fingers digging into the flesh beneath my chin. But B must have seen the submission showing through my contact lenses.
"There we go," he said. "Always good to see we're on the same page." He released me and leaned back against the red Naugahyde upholstery.
I rubbed at my throat, waiting to be dismissed. Or whatever was coming next.
"I'll be in touch," he said. "Don't stray far. And, in the future, try to avoid the instinct to display too much initiative."
He didn't have to tell me to get lost.
• • •
Sometimes it feels like there's something ironic about my having had more friends when I was alive and living on the street-alive and shooting smack and eating out of dumpsters and sleeping in abandoned buildings-than I have now. Then again, I write that down and consider how I probably have the whole thing backwards. Dead girls who turn into werewolves get more friends than homeless living girls who happen to be junkies? How's that, Quinn? You think the filthy smidgen of infamy you've "earned" as a corpsified, bestial hit woman is ever gonna be rewarded with anyone's gratitude? Ha-ha and ha. The nasties mostly hate me. A handful fear me. And what passes for rules down here in Hade's little half acre in earth say I don't go mixing with the living. Leastways, not unless the living are in on the secrecy. The ones who are, mostly who'd want to spend time in their company? The Maidstone girls, just for an example.
Anyway, Quinn, shove the pity party up your derriere. But that afternoon, after Drusneth and the talking-to by Mean Mr. B (never did find out what his name was that day), I found myself needing a friend. Which put me shit outta luck. Clemency Hate-evil, she was gone, bye-bye, and so was Aloysius, a troll who'd lived under the 195 overpass at the end of Gano Street, near my old apartment. At the time, I believed he'd been murdered by a trio of vamps gunning for me, trying to draw me out. I never had figured out who they were working for, and in the end, the end of my being caught up in the Bride and Evangelista's little catfight, I'd just chalked his death up to . . .
To what, Quinn? Don't they call that being an innocent bystander? Collateral damage? Wrong place, wrong time? Knowing the wrong people, so that gets you killed? Yeah. Like the wise man from Montreal said, "Everybody knows, that's the way it goes."
Anyway.
By the time I left Babe's, it was snowing pretty hard. I never much paid attention to weather forecasts. Who gives a shit if it's cold when the cold doesn't cause you discomfort? I'd lost my parka and sweater back at the whorehouse, so there I was, strolling along in my black Radiohead T-shirt. Loved that shirt. It read Kicking Squealing Gucci Little Piggy, which I'd always thought summed up an awful lot about the world. Had it until a few years back, when I lost it in a fight with . . . but that's another story for another time. If anyone I passed thought twice about the girl out in a snowstorm in nothing but a T-shirt and jeans, they were wise enough to keep it to themselves. Good little piggies. Mind your own damn business, you live longer. Or not. Sort of a crapshoot, that.
I headed over to Eastside Market and bought a few 3 Musketeers bars, 'cause Aloysius had always loved that shit with the passion of the white hot sun. Don't ask me why. It's a troll thing, I suppose. I also stopped in a liquor store and picked up a pint of Jacquin's ginger-flavored brandy . . . another of Aloysius' fave indulgences. I'd have completed the set with a stack of porno mags, but I didn't feel like trekking to a convenience store or a newsstand. I had in mind I'd set the crap up like one of those shrines you see by the side of the road, where someone's died in a car crash or a drive-by shooting. It was odd. Truthfully, I'd done a good job of not thinking about Aloysius over the past six months. No use crying over goddamn spilled milk. But that night, well . . . spilled milk suddenly seemed awfully important.
I went down to the overpass, my offerings in a brown paper bag. Not much of the snow was blowing into that sheltered place, and I sat awhile staring out at the orange sky over Providence. Then I opened the bag and lined the candy bars up along the top edge of a guardrail. I put the bottle of brandy in a scrubby brown patch of grass beneath them. Then I sat down on the frozen dirt and gravel and just stared into the shadows.