Waking the Moon

I stared at her and shivered.

“Boy, she is a looker, huh? And she looks just like that in real life, I mean in L.A., some of these girls you see on TV or in the movies, you see ’em in real life and pffft—” Jack made a disgusted sound, his eyes still fixed on the screen. “But she’s the real thing, I tell you.”

“Her eyes aren’t real,” I said.

“Huh?”

“Her eyes—those are green contacts; her eyes aren’t really that color.”

Jack stared at the screen, then shrugged. “Well, whose are? You think she’s a dyke?”

“Angelica?” I said softly. “I don’t think so—I mean, I don’t think she used to be. I always sort of thought of her as pansexual.”

Jack snorted. “Yeah, sure. Her and what’s-his-name. And I’m the Ludovicher Rabbi.”

From behind the couch strode Angelica’s two bodyguards. The black tank tops flowed into army-style khaki shorts, and they wore lace-up black leather boots with thick clunky toes and nasty-looking metal spurs. The one with the crescent moon tattoo had a long thin braid falling down her back, its end tied with a leather thong hung with crimson feathers and what appeared to be bones. Jack stared at her admiringly, then sighed and wiped the corner of his mouth with a paper towel.

“Well, listen, kiddo, I got to go.”

The two Amazons flanked Angelica, their heads held high like pro wrestlers. I had to admit it made a striking tableau, those two black-haired beauties guarding their golden idol. Angelica smiled and nodded as her guardians looked around the room, eyes glittering. As Opal’s theme music surged Angelica turned. Her bodyguards smiled, thin mirthless smiles like those of a dreaming cat, and escorted their mistress offstage.

“Wow. I still can’t believe that was Angelica.”

Jack grinned. “What a piece of work. ‘Angelica Furiano.’ The Avenging Angel. Sounds like she made it up.”

“When I knew her, her name was Angelica di Rienzi.” I sighed and shook my head. “God, I can’t believe it’s been that long. I completely lost touch with her, you know? For a couple of months it was like we were bonded at the hip, and then—” I stared sadly at the TV screen. “I never heard from her again. Christ, I’d love to see her.”

Jack took a last bite of his chicken vindaloo and shoved the paper plate beside a video monitor. “Well, like I told you, she married this count guy from Italy. Erica said he was like one of the three richest guys in the country. When he died it all went to Angelica, and I can tell you his first three wives weren’t happy about that at all. Ah well, gotta fly.”

He stood and picked up his bag, a worn Guatemalan rucksack. “Have fun at the festival. I’ll have one of my boys see if they can track down a local distributor for Pink Pelican and send you a case.”

I walked him to the door. “When will you be back in D.C.?”

Jack hugged me to him, gave the top of my head a swiping kiss. “Shit, I dunno. Christmas I’ll be visiting my dad in Florida, maybe I’ll be through then. We’re test-marketing this new software program in the fall, a tie-in with the big dinosaur exhibit reopening at that other museum in New York. Maybe I’ll be out then. We can check out the mosh pits downtown.”

We walked down the hall, Jack stopping at every door to read the cartoons posted there and hooting with laughter. Finally we reached the end of the corridor. At the head of the broad curving stairway he stopped.

“Well, listen, Sweeney, it’s been a slice, like always.”

He took a few steps, then turned to look back at me. “And listen—I was going to call Erica when I get back, she’s still got all my Arvo Part CDs. You want me to see if I can get your friend Angelica’s number from her? She and Erica have mutual friends or something, they used to run into each other a lot.”

I nodded eagerly. “That would be great, Jack! I mean it—I’m sure Angelica remembers me, tell Erica —”

He waved me away. “Sure, sure. See you, kiddo.”

I watched him descend the steps, taking them two at a time like a kid eager to get out of class. Then I went back to my office.

The little room smelled of cumin and fenugreek. From outside came the high skirling wail of flutes, the carousel’s ghostly fanfare. Billowing smoke from the Aditi’s outdoor grills mingled with the yellow dust of the Mall’s wide walkways. I turned from the window and for a long moment stared at the TV screen. The credits for Opal’s show were still running—This program was previously recorded in front of a live audience—the music soaring until it was rudely cut off by a commercial for tooth powder. I turned off the TV and closed my door, settled into my chair, and for a few minutes rocked thoughtfully back and forth.

Angelica Furiano. The Avenging Angel. I thought of those two Amazons, of Opal Purlstein and women across the country crowding her workshops, listening to her talk about the rights of women and becoming empowered. Kickboxers and former nuns and slacker dykes, New Age hausfraus and fin de siecle suffragettes.

“What a crock,” I said out loud.

But then I thought of when I had last seen Angelica, nearly two decades ago: a beautiful young girl rising naked from the water in the shadow of the Orphic Lodge, a young girl striding through the dust, dancing around a lowing bull in a dark field. I thought of her lying in the grass with Oliver; I thought of Oliver himself with his poor mutilated scalp and his mad blue eyes, making that last leap of faith from the window of a closet at Providence Hospital. I thought of all these things; and of Balthazar Warnick staring at me from atop a curving staircase; of Francis Xavier Connelly helping to push Magda Kurtz into the wasteland; of a boy’s reedy voice cutting through the darkness like a heated wire through black glass.

From the gargoyles to Stonehenge
From the Sphinx to the pyramids
From Lucifer’s temples praising the Devil right,
To the Devil’s clock as it strikes midnight—
I have always been here before…

I thought of them all, and of Hasel Bright lying facedown in a pond in the Virginia woods. And Angelica so rich and famous that she had homes in Los Angeles and Italy and god knows where else; of Angelica writing best-selling books and having a following that could number in the thousands, maybe in the tens or hundreds of thousands for all I knew. I had no idea at all what she’d been doing all those years—writing books, I guess; teaching people to go whoo-whoo at the moon. Above the haunted strains of the carousel and the faint cries of children, I heard Oliver’s voice the last time I had seen him alive—

“…don’t you worry about her: Angelica is destined for Big Things. Very, very Big Things—” I thought of Hasel’s letter. After a few more minutes I got out of my chair. I walked to the door and made certain it was shut, then reached for my phone and called Baby Joe in New York.

CHAPTER 12 The Priestess at Huitaca

WHY DON’T YOU ALL take the night off? I don’t think you’ve had a day off since Opal.” Angelica di Rienzi Furiano reached for her glass of chardonnay. She raised it, toasting the sun where it struck bolts of violet and gold from the edge of the butte that rose above her home. In its delicate goblet the wine glowed. A tiny bee with green eyes hovered above the lip of the glass. Angelica flicked at it with a carefully sculpted fingernail. The bee spun off and disappeared into the late afternoon light. Angelica sipped thoughtfully at her wine, suddenly smiled. “I know! Dr. Adder’s playing in Flagstaff, you could go see that. It’s supposed to be pretty