The Misfortune Cookie

“No. Nothing like that. It was all very . . . mundane.” Well, in Max’s sense of the word, anyhow: non-mystical.

“Hmm. Did he seem to be under stress at any point during the proceedings?”

At various points in the “proceedings,” I thought Lopez had seemed like his head might explode. So I said, “Yes, at times. Why?”

“Well, one possibility for the incidents that you and I have previously discussed is that they are coincidence. After all, mathematically, coincidences are more common and more probable than most people suppose. But the other possibility, of course, is that Detective Lopez possesses mystical power of which he is unaware,” said Max. “In which case, I theorize that extreme stress triggers these interesting events. His emotions and his focus become powerful enough for him to affect matter and energy, though it’s not conscious and he doesn’t realize it’s happening.”

When we were all trapped in a pitch-dark church with a murderer who was prepared to turn me into the next victim, electric light had suddenly been generated by the sabotaged system at the exact moment that Lopez (very loudly) wished for it. When Lopez was in an underground tunnel with a killer who was (literally) about to rip off another cop’s head, suddenly there was a huge, fiery explosion that Lopez and the other cops survived while the killer perished. When a villain had tried to escape from Lopez by holding a gun to my head, he’d been foiled by an exploding shower of fiery light inside Fenster & Co. And on one occasion, when Lopez and I were having a particularly volatile evening, my bed had burst into flames—while we were on it together.

In other words, strange things happened around him.

“Always involving fire and light,” Max mused. “Quite intriguing, when you consider that, during our search in Harlem for a Vodou sorcerer who was bargaining with dark powers, Detective Lopez was briefly possessed by the spirit of Ogoun.”

“A warrior,” I said, remembering what Max had told me as I fretted over Lopez’s unconscious body in the aftermath of that incident. “A protector.”

“And a spirit of fire.”

Yes, during Lopez’s involuntary possession trance in a Vodou ceremony, there had been quite a bit of playing with flames and red-hot coals.

“So this power that you suspect he possesses . . .” I said.

“May well be focused in or derived from fire,” said Max. “I postulate some form of pyrokinesis. Innate, obviously, rather than learned.”

“But Max,” I said, shaking my head, “how could he possess that sort of power without knowing? I mean . . . wouldn’t you notice if you had an innate ability to make things burn, explode, or light up?”

“Oh, no, not necessarily,” Max said, shaking his head. “If it’s an ability he’s had since birth or his early years, then the unconscious processes that create these events would feel so normal to him as to be unnoticeable. And if these incidents occur only in moments of extreme stress, as so far seems to be the case, then they are probably too irregular for any mundane person in his life—including himself—to perceive a pattern, let alone to identify him as the source of that pattern. Moreover, Detective Lopez is quite prone to seek— indeed, to insist on—conventional explanations even for phenomena he finds puzzling and outside his experience.”

“That much is true,” I said, recalling my many arguments with Lopez, who thought I was a flake—and who thought Max was crazy and possibly dangerous.

“Such gifts are quite rare,” said Max, “but failure to recognize them is not. Well, not in the contemporary Western culture that Detective Lopez inhabits, that is. Had he been born in a superstitious village a century ago— or, indeed, born almost anywhere in the world when I was a young man—then his fate might well be quite different. In those days, a person around whom multiple strange incidents occurred would soon have attracted the worst sort of superstitious fear and suspicion.”

As he said this, I realized again how perilous so much of Max’s existence must have been.

I thought over everything he’d said, then settled on what struck me as the most relevant questions. “Do you think this gift makes Lopez unintentionally dangerous? Or places him in danger?”

“Well . . .” I could tell from Max’s expression that these questions had already occurred to him. Some time ago, probably. He said gently, “Danger of some sort is always among the possibilities of possessing such a gift, but never the only possibility. And much like a material gift, a mystical gift can be recognized or neglected, valued or wasted, and used with wisdom or with profligacy.”

I didn’t know what “profligacy” was, but I got the gist of his meaning. I picked up another cookie and munched as I thought it over. “If you’re right about him, then I think this gift is going to remain unrecognized, Max. Things are pretty strained between us these days, but even if they weren’t, I can easily imagine Lopez’s response to my explaining he has mystical power and just doesn’t know it.” I’d get a more serious response if I told him I was the Pope in disguise.

“Indeed. And since I am theorizing rather than speaking with certainty,” said Max, “there would be little point in pursuing the matter with him at this juncture.”

“Well, that’s a relief.” Because I really couldn’t picture that conversation going well.

“You seem quite hungry,” Max said as he watched me reach for another cookie. “May I offer you dinner?”

“Dinner.” I nodded enthusiastically, enthralled by that suggestion. The cookies were waking up my stomach and making me realize how ravenous my tight budget had made me.

The bells chimed, indicating that someone was entering the bookstore. Nelli woke up and lifted her head.

“Hello?” It was a man’s voice. “Dr. Zadok? Are you here?”

“Back here,” called Max, rising from his chair to greet the visitor. Then he said to me, “How about some Chinese food, Esther? We could avoid this nasty weather by having it delivered.”

“Good idea,” I said, picturing crunchy egg rolls, plump dumplings, chicken stir-fry, and rice pancakes stuffed with pork in a rich sauce. (I don’t keep kosher, obviously.)

A tall, handsome Chinese-American man who looked like he was my age or a little younger came around the bookcase that blocked our view of the doorway. He was carrying a brown paper bag in his arms. There were some Chinese letters on it. Below that, in English, was printed the phrase: Kwong’s Chinese Carry-Out.

I looked at Max in surprise. “That was fast.”

“Indeed.” Max looked down at himself with a puzzled frown, as if wondering whether he had managed to conjure the food delivery without realizing it.

“Dr. Zadok?” the man asked.

“Yes. But, er, I don’t think we order—”

“Here’s your delivery!” The man held his finger up to his lips, indicating we should be silent.

Max and I exchanged a perplexed glance as the guy set the food bag down on the walnut table, shoving aside a pile of books to make room for it. He had a lean, athletic build, slim without being skinny. Neatly combed black hair framed an attractive face. He was also unusually well dressed for someone delivering carry-out. He wore a black wool coat over a black suit and tie, with a crisp white shirt. I noticed that his polished black shoes were wet from the sleet outside.

Having shed the carry-out bag, he reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper. After again indicating that we should be silent, he handed it to Max.

As he did so, he was saying, “Egg rolls, steamed dumplings, shrimp in garlic sauce, spicy duck, roast pork . . . Is that everything you ordered?”

“Oooh! Is that really what you brought?” I asked eagerly.

Both men turned to look at me.

“Um, never mind.” I rose from my chair and approached them as Max unfolded the paper he’d been handed. The enticing aromas wafting from the carry-out bag distracted me, and I decided that no matter what this stranger’s odd arrival was actually about, I was going to investigate that bag in a minute. But first, I peered over Max’s shoulder as he started reading the note written on the creased sheet of paper:

I think there’s been a murder. The kind you specialize in. If I’m right, you know how messy that can get. So we got to look into it and nip this thing in the butt.