Chapter 22
22
D uring their time away, Holly had made good use of her contacts and found a woman on intimate terms with Agent Johnston. She was willing to talk—for a fee, of course.
Alistair met her on neutral ground, in a tiny chop suey restaurant halfway between Cicero and the Loop. She was thin and nervous, her red hair cut in a short bob, her chest nearly nonexistent. When he arrived, a small pile of fresh cigarette butts already rested in the ashtray in front of her.
He slid in across from her and ordered a cup of coffee from the waitress, which arrived with alacrity. “Are you Viola?” he asked, even though she was the only redhead in the joint.
“Yeah. You the cat?”
He nodded. “Call me Alistair.”
She took a long pull on her cigarette, then flicked the ash into the tray. “I’ll tell you what I know about Irvin on one condition. I want a ticket to San Francisco and first month’s rent for an apartment when I get there.”
“That’s two conditions.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Don’t play with me. I’m not squealing on Irvin unless I can put half a continent between him and me, understand?”
“Yes.” He reached into his inner coat pocket and took out an envelope, which he slid across to her. She opened it, riffled quickly through the bills inside, then tucked it into her purse.
“Thanks—you’re real swell.” She took a swallow of strong coffee, then went back to her cigarette. “This town…I don’t know what trouble they’ve got in Frisco, but it’s got to be better than here.”
“Because of the gangs?” he asked, wondering if she might let anything interesting drop.
“The gangs, the shootings, the prohees—it’s all a mess.” She stubbed out the cigarette. “Fabiano is crazy, and Sullivan is a snake, and the prohees are out of control. Sooner or later, there’s going to be a bloodbath, and I want to be long gone before it starts.”
Fur and feathers, he hoped she was wrong. Feared she wasn’t. “Speaking of prohees…”
“Right.” She sat back in the booth, her hands folded on the table, fingers like jumbled sticks. “I know all about Agent Irvin Johnston…”
Sam took off his cap as they stepped through the church doors.
After everything that had happened, he’d completely forgotten about the torn page he’d found hidden in the athanor. It didn’t seem important, certainly not when compared with their other problems.
But Alistair waited for him when he arrived home one night with the news they’d found someone to translate the Latin written on the page: a priest of the Roman Catholic Church.
Unlike the Irish or the Slavic Orthodox congregations—or any of the other factions led by the competing popes, for that matter—the Roman masses were still held in Latin. Hopefully, the priests actually studied the language, rather than simply memorizing their lines.
The church stood in the Loop, surrounded by skyscrapers. It held its own even so, its boxy shape and marble facade drawing the eye despite the flashier buildings butted up against it. The interior was relatively simple as well, the walls and floor of mostly unadorned marble. Warm candlelight filled the nave, turning the fastidiously polished pews to gold. The scent of beeswax dominated the air, underlain by faint traces of incense.
Alistair slunk in after him, peering around almost distrustfully. “Be nice if they used some of the money it took to build this joint to help people in need,” he muttered.
Sam shushed him. “We need their help, remember?”
“So keep my opinions to myself. Got it.” Alistair dropped into the pew farthest from the sanctuary. “You can sweet-talk the priest if we find one.”
Unsure what to do, Sam walked slowly up the aisle. As he did so, a discrete door opened and an older man in a priest’s collar came in.
Unaccountably nervous, Sam hurried over to him. “Um, Father?” Was that how he was supposed to address a priest?
The priest turned a welcoming smile on him. The candlelight gleamed off his bald head; only a thin fringe of white hair clung on beneath. “Yes? How can I help you?”
“I have an, ah, unusual request.” Sam fished in his pocket for the paper. “Can you read Latin? I’m not a, uh, member of your congregation,” he added, and could almost sense Alistair rolling his eyes.
“You’re welcome to join us at any time, young man,” the priest assured him. “And yes, I can read Latin.”
“Can you tell me what this says?” he held out the paper, and the priest took it.
“This seems to be quite old.” The priest frowned slightly, took a pair of spectacles from his pocket, and put them on. “Hmm. How odd. It says something like ‘In order for purification, the three elements must be united: body, soul, and the spark of life. Thence from the chaos of imperfection is brought forth the pure substance that will order all it touches.’ And of course, beneath: ‘True prima materia—first material—is human.’”
Sam’s mind raced. What could it mean? Body, soul, and the spark of life could refer to healing, he supposed. As for first materia, perhaps something from the patient—blood?—would be needed to create it?
Or it was just another symbolic representation? In the writings of the old hexmaker who’d owned the Paris lab, there’d been a great deal about cosmology, and the human body as a symbol for the levels of existence, and even stranger things.
“Does that help?” the priest asked as he handed the paper back.
“I’m not sure.” Sam stared down at it. “Thank you, Father.”
“Of course. Again, do feel free to join us for mass. Ten o’clock every Sunday!”
Sam gave him a pallid smile, then turned and hurried back up the aisle to where Alistair waited. As soon as they were outside, he recounted what the priest had told him.
“So what the hell does that mean?” Alistair asked when he finished.
“I don’t know.” Sam wiped his brow under the hot sun, then put his cap back on. “A lot of old hexmaking was symbolic. And as much chemistry as magic, just to make it even more complicated. So, for example, an athanor might symbolize a person, but still just be an athanor in usage, if that makes sense?”
“Not really.”
“Honestly, I don’t think this is anything important.” Sam looked at the page again, then stuffed it in his pocket. It had seemed to have so much potential when he grabbed it, but now, faced with his mother dying in a hospital, it felt like a distraction. Pointless. “Vic made a note as part of his research, and it ended up in the old athanor somehow.”
Alistair sighed. “Oh well. It was a good try, Sam. Whatever it is, it doesn’t seem to have anything to do with Bobby.”
“I thought you’d decided to quit working with Johnston?”
“Oh, I have.” He scowled. “Especially after what Viola told me about him. I figured it wouldn’t hurt to chase down this one last lead…but it’s a dead-end, just like everything else.”
“Yeah.” Sam felt a faint flash of guilt, recalling Bobby’s weight in his arms, the sound of his voice begging for help…
But they’d done everything they could. Put their own necks on the line. And still come up with nothing.
It was time to forget about Bobby, and concentrate on the living.