An Incident At Bloodtide

Christ's sake, they've been married two years, and he doesn't even realize she's queer, or that she spent six months in a mental hospital after she almost baked her brains on peyote. She and I have done things together she probably doesn't even remember.'

'You know what Robin Williams says about the sixties,' I replied with a shrug. 'If you remember them, you probably weren't there. What's your point?'

He rattled the melting ice cubes, then leaned back in the chair, studying me through narrowed lids. He was obviously not getting the audience response he wanted, and now looked even more disappointed. 'I'm saying that you're wasting your time if you came here to try to get Mary to change her mind.'

I retrieved a straight-backed chair from across the room, pushed a microphone out of the way, and sat down across from the other man. 'Big fella, you seem to be under the mistaken impression that I give a shit about what you, Mary, or Garth decide to do. I care what happens to my brother and Mary, and I wish them happiness, but I have enough trouble managing my own life and times without trying to tell other people how to manage theirs. I may think you're a prick for surfacing in their lives and disrupting them like you have, but you're Mary and Garth's problem, not mine. This matter is between the three of you, and it's none of my damn business.'

I watched him watching me as he reached out with one of his long arms and began to absently turn his empty tumbler on the glass-topped table beside him. I knew he was trying to gauge my sincerity, and so I gazed back at him with my most sincere expression-which in this case was meant to project profound indifference. Finally he asked, 'If you don't think it's any of your business, why are you here?'

'Just to touch base, say hello, and hear her tell me she's all right. Mary's more than just a sister-in-law, big fella, she's my friend. She talks to me. Does that make you nervous?'

Sacra Silver didn't like that, and he flushed slightly. 'Nothing you could do or say would make me nervous, Frederickson. The fact of the matter is that I'll be surprised if she wants to talk to you about anything.'

'We'll see, won't we?' I replied, leaning forward slightly in my chair. 'I take it Sacra Silver is a witch name. You fancy yourself a ceremonial magician, or are you a member of a coven?'

That startled him. He recovered quickly, but not before I had seen the surprise reflected in his eyes, and watched him tense slightly. 'What are you talking about?'

'Oh, come on, Sacra. Don't be coy. I can read your aura. You think you can practice the craft.'

'You don't see shit,' he said, but his tone was wary. 'Where did you get that idea?'

'Oh, I don't know. The notion might have come up in a conversation between Garth and me, which means it probably came up in a conversation between Garth and Mary.'

His response was to shake his head. 'Mary would never say. . Your brother didn't hear anything like that from Mary.'

'If you say so. Then I must have heard it someplace else.'

'How do you know the term 'ceremonial magician'? What do you know about the craft?'

Feigning indifference in Sacra Silver and all his works, I had apparently managed to pique his interest, and in the past I had often been downright amazed at how much curious people will reveal about themselves as they attempt to probe the lives of another person. I wasn't interested in killing this particular cat, only hooking him. I figured I had done that, and that it was time to play him on the line for a while to see if I might not be able to cast a little spell of my own. I flashed what I hoped was an enigmatic smile, rose. 'I think I'll have a drink,' I said, and started for the door. Then, in what I hoped was an Oscar-winning characterization of debonair indifference laced with graciousness, I paused, turned back, and pointed to his empty glass. I asked casually, 'You want another one?'

Sacra Silver was either too distracted to question this rather odd gesture of subservience or just too lazy to get up and get his own drink. He only thought about it for a second or two, then picked up his glass and held it out to me. 'Yeah,' he said somewhat absently. 'Dewar's.'

Holding the tumbler by the base, I went to the kitchen, headed directly for the cabinet where Mary kept her plastic wrap. I had already taken note of the license plate of the car in the driveway, but somehow Sacra Silver didn't seem to me to be a green Cadillac kind of guy, and I thought the vehicle might be a company car or borrowed; besides, I wanted more than what I could get from Motor Vehicles-assuming there was more to get. I tore off a sheet of the plastic, wrapped it around the tumbler, which I placed at the back of the shelf, behind a jar of spaghetti sauce. Then I went to the bar in the living room, put some ice into an identical tumbler, splashed in some Dewar's. I poured myself a Jack Daniel's on the rocks, then headed back to the spider in the music room.

'Ceremonial magic is a bit different from garden-variety witchcraft, isn't it, pal?' I said easily as I handed him his fresh drink. 'More dangerous. The ceremonial magician works alone. You don't have other members of a coven to help you absorb the rebound you're going to get if you attack somebody you shouldn't, namely a person who can reflect the bad news back at you.'

'You're very well read, Frederickson,' Silver said in a neutral tone.

'Oh, I'm more than well read. Let's see what you know about ceremonial magic and other aspects of the craft. Here's a witch name for you: Esobus. Ever hear that one?'

He did not reply, but he moved his chair back an inch or two, and pulled his chin in slightly, as if to protect himself. His jet-black eyes now reflected not only surprise but growing caution, perhaps even concern.

'Okay,' I continued, 'that one stumped you. Let's try a few more. Sandor Peth? John Krowl? Daniel? Who's buried in Aleister Crowley's tomb?'

'Peth, Krowl, and Daniel are legendary ceremonial magicians,' Silver replied tightly.

'Dead legendary ceremonial magicians. I could mention a few more names you might recognize, and they're dead too. Actually, they were mostly legends in their own minds-and yours, I guess. Except for Daniel and Esobus, they were real idiots, preying on idiots.'

'You're full of shit, Frederickson.'

'Oh, no, I'm not. You know I know what I'm talking about.'

I could see that he was struggling not to say the word, but it came out anyway. 'How?'

'I was once in love with a witch, who happened to save my life. Also, I once spent a few months dancing around with a bunch of creeps who had the same belief system I suspect you have. I picked up a few things. Those people I mentioned caught the biggest, damnedest rebound of all-death. Esobus, by the way, also saved my life, and I was sorry I couldn't return the favor. I was with her when she died.'

'She?'

'Oh, yes. Esobus was a woman, and she happened to be a good friend of mine.'

'I still say you're full of shit.'

'Sure I am.'

'Who was Esobus? What was her real name?'

'You sure as hell don't know, and you're not going to find out from me. When she died, she and I were the only two people who knew her secret. I think I'll keep it that way. I will tell you that she was a respected scientist who was trying to do a number on people like you who do numbers on other people. She looked on what she was doing as a research project, and she was under the mistaken impression that she was going to learn something valuable from the experience. All it did was kill her. I also knew Daniel, who happened to be a very good man. I can assure you the rest were idiots. I guess my point is that you should be careful who you choose as role models. I think I'm also offering you a little friendly advice about who you choose to throw bad spells at, because they're liable to bounce back and hit you right between the eyes. My experience has been that witches and ceremonial magicians who try to work the dark side of the craft are usually shits-for-brains. But hey, I'm not offending you, am I? We're just having a casual conversation about a particularly loony belief system, right? I mean, I know you don't think I'm suggesting that you're a shit-for-brains. If I did think that, I might try to catch you off guard and do a number on your head like you've done to Mary's-assuming, of course, that I cared one way or another.'

'I can inflict great suffering on you, Frederickson,' the other man said in a low, tense voice.

'The last man who said that to me died with blood running out of his mouth, nose, eyes, ears, and ass, and I didn't lay a finger on him. In a sense, he self-destructed. Just like you, he'd bought into a particularly dangerous belief system. Sure, you can hurt me, but I'm in no more danger from you than from any other pain in the ass who might come at me with a knife or gun. You're in more danger from what you believe than I am, because I don't believe it.'

'I hope I never have to prove you wrong, Frederickson. I can make very bad things happen to you, and I don't