Traven shifts his weight. The subject makes him uncomfortable.
“Via Dolorosa,” says Vidocq. “ ‘The Way of Sorrow.’ It’s something the father learned while you were gone.”
“I suppose you inspired me,” says Traven. “I’ve spent my whole life sitting by myself among books. I thought the work I was doing was important and that I was important. The sin of pride. Then I watched you march off to Hell by yourself and I knew that reading old books wasn’t enough anymore.”
“And that’s what Dolores is?”
“You could say that.”
“Is it a trick or something? Show me.”
Traven shakes his head and looks at the sparse mix of civilians and Lurkers. He isn’t used to seeing humans mixing with what he probably considers monsters. But he’s dealing with it all right.
He says, “At the right time and place. When you tell me more about what happened in Hell, I’ll tell you about the Dolorosa.”
“Deal.”
My legs shake so slightly it’s barely noticeable.
“Did you feel something just now? A little earthquake?”
“No,” says Vidocq. “Father?”
Traven shakes his head.
“Never mind. It’s probably me. I’m still getting my land legs.”
The bar doors open and standing there is my favorite professional zombie hunter, Brigitte Bardo. Ex-professional. It’s not like she quit the business, but when there aren’t any zombies left to hunt, it’s hard to stay pro. She was also a porn star in Europe. Lots of civilians in occult work and Lurkers do sex work because the money is good and they can’t deal with regular jobs. There’s something else about Brigitte and it’s not pretty and it comes to me every time I think about her. A zombie bit her while we were hunting together. We found a cure and Vidocq gave it to her but it was my sloppiness that almost turned her into maybe the worst thing in the world.>No one thinks of L.A. as ever being cold, but when it’s winter and the clouds roll in and the temperature drops to sixty or below, it can feel downright chilly. But the armor doesn’t notice. It has its own heat gauge set at body temperature. I could probably go to Antarctica and feed the penguins in nothing but flip-flops and a serape and not shiver once.
On the dying edge of Hollywood Boulevard, another tourist trap is going out of business. I buy a couple of black button-down shirts with HOLLYWOOD spelled with palm trees over the breast pocket. They’re loose enough that they hide the armor without making me look like the Michelin Man.
Back at the Beat Hotel, I take the one peeper I kept with me out of its saline-filled container, pop out my eye, and put the peeper in. Nothing happens. I can’t see into Hell. Not the library, the grounds outside the palace, or through the peepers I put into the hellhounds. Lucifer is blind up here. Something else Samael kept to himself. I take the peeper out and put my eye back in.
Back when Samael was in L.A. and I was playing bodyguard, he told me that he had very little power on Earth. That’s probably why he gave Kasabian access to the Daimonion Codex. Lucifer can’t see it from here but half-dead Kasabian can.
I spend the rest of the afternoon playing around with the armor, seeing what Lucifer tricks I can pull up here. I find a few but nothing that’ll get me a Nobel Prize. As usual I’ve timed things perfectly. I hang around Hell long enough to get all of Lucifer’s power and then come home and lose most of it.
In the afternoon, Candy calls. She wants to meet at the Bamboo House of Dolls around ten. Why not? It’s that or more Brady Bunch reruns, and that’s goddamn depressing for the Lord of the Underworld, even when he’s only operating at half speed.
Before I leave, I unscrew the air vent with a dime. What do you know? Kasabian wasn’t just shining me on. There’s a carny roll of twenty hundred-bills inside. The day just suddenly got brighter. What’s ridiculous is how easy I am to buy off. Two grand out of two hundred and I want to kiss the sky? Don’t let it get around but it turns out Lucifer is the cheapest date in Hell.
Now, this is something solid and real. It smells like beer and whiskey and the sweat of the patrons and the cigarette smoke blown in through the doors by the trailing edge of a Santa Ana, which is just how it should be. It’s a bar’s job to be unambiguous. In a sea of troubles, you can hold on to a bar. The Bamboo House of Dolls is my Rock of Ages.
Everything is where it should be. Old Iggy and the Stooges and back-in-the-day L.A. punk-band posters. Behind the bar, it’s all palm fronds, plastic hula girls, and coconut bowls for the peanuts. The jukebox chips and coos as Yma Sumac warbles through a spooky “Chuncho.” Carlos the bartender is pouring shots of Jack for everyone bellied up at the bar and mine taste best because they’re free. I hold up my glass to toast him for the third time tonight and he holds up his. It’s that kind of night. I’m in my bar with my friends. Now I’m really home.
Vidocq has his arm around my shoulders. He’s hardly taken it off since he got here, like if he lets go I’ll blow away on the breeze.
“At least it wasn’t eleven years this time. You’re doing better,” he says.
“Maybe you should try not going back at all,” says Allegra.
“I signed up with Monsters Anonymous,” I tell them. “Trying to kick the Hell habit one day at a time.”
“I’ll drink to that,” says Vidocq. He holds up his empty glass and Carlos comes over and refills it.
Carlos says, “I wasn’t sure if it was you when you walked in. Even with that fucked-up face, I’m still not a hundred percent.”
He starts to pour me my sixth Jack of the night. I put my hand over the glass.