problems this summer without one of those. Muttering an excuse to the John Henrys, I came around the table on a jagged line to intercept as he made for the casino. I trailed him casually, sidestepping MegaBucks and scurrying around the blackjack tables, trying not to move so aggressively that the eye-in-the-sky would spot me for a threat. I didn’t mean to hurt him any; just warn him off. Tell him to head north for Chicago: the windy city’s animae have always had a habit of taking in strays.
But I saw him stop, intent on something that had drawn his eye—a flash of golden hair alongside a strobing slot machine light—and my eye followed his, and I saw—
“Stewart?”
Walking hunched forward slightly as he made some sort of a point with his hands— jab, jab, jab —animated in conversation with three companions, the hairstyle different, longer, but the crooked nose unmistakably the same.
He didn’t hear me. I wasn’t close.
The vampire’s gaze fastened on the four men crossing the casino floor, and he stepped back into the shadows behind a row of video poker machines, obviously eager that Stewart and his three companions shouldn’t see his face. I glanced after the vampire as he faded from view, but Stewart took precedence. And if the bloodsucker chose to stay in my city, I’d run across him again eventually.
I hurried toward Stewart, making a mental survey of his companions as I came, trying to decide if an intercession was in order, or an introduction. Introduction, I decided. By the tenor of the conversation, these were Stewart’s friends. Especially the shorter of the two strong-chinned, slender, black-haired men, who bore a superficial resemblance to one another. The final man was African-American, muscular and athletic, handsome in a rugged rather than a Tiger Woods sort of way. Familiar, too—but everybody looks like somebody famous, in Vegas.
“Stewart,” I called, and held out my hand as the little group drew abreast of me and started to pass me by.
Stewart blinked and turned to me, a thin vertical line between his eyes. “I beg your pardon. Do I know you?” he asked, and my heart thumped once in my chest and went still.
It wasn’t him. It could have been, from fifteen feet. From close enough to shake his hand, however . . . no. Not quite. Not the face, and not the faint European accent and subtle precision of pronunciation.
“No,” I said, and backed away. “I beg your pardon. But you look very much like someone I—”
I used to know.
I turned on the heel of my Doc and went back to the restaurant, cursing myself for failing to follow the vampire instead. Cursing myself for the hope I’d felt, however briefly, and for the fresh sharpness of the broken ache in my chest.
I knew who they were now; the penny had dropped.
Not just not Stewart.
Ghosts. More ghosts, summoned up out of the collective unconscious, called up out of the soup of story. I shook my head, sat down in my still-warm chair, and looked up into the eyes of the memory of two dead men.
At least I’d thought of something the John Henrys could do to help until I figured out how to manage Angel, immaterial or not. I bet they could be pretty good at keeping track of a vampire, if they were careful, and stayed out of sight.
Meanwhile, I could try to figure out what it was that I’d summoned home to Vegas. A namesake rite wasn’t supposed to work that way—and I shouldn’t have had the power to do it, even if it did. I was starting to think I’d managed to call home every ghost—media, legendary, and the “little” ghosts, the ghosts of the unquiet dead, like Bugsy out there—with even the vaguest of connections to my city.
That could get confusing.
Especially if two or three Howard Hugheses showed up.
Tribute and the Streetwalker with a Heart of Gold.
Las Vegas, Summer, 2002.
It was full dark by the time I left the mint-green glow of the MGM Grand behind me and walked north, counting the cracks in the
But I saw him stop, intent on something that had drawn his eye—a flash of golden hair alongside a strobing slot machine light—and my eye followed his, and I saw—
“Stewart?”
Walking hunched forward slightly as he made some sort of a point with his hands— jab, jab, jab —animated in conversation with three companions, the hairstyle different, longer, but the crooked nose unmistakably the same.
He didn’t hear me. I wasn’t close.
The vampire’s gaze fastened on the four men crossing the casino floor, and he stepped back into the shadows behind a row of video poker machines, obviously eager that Stewart and his three companions shouldn’t see his face. I glanced after the vampire as he faded from view, but Stewart took precedence. And if the bloodsucker chose to stay in my city, I’d run across him again eventually.
I hurried toward Stewart, making a mental survey of his companions as I came, trying to decide if an intercession was in order, or an introduction. Introduction, I decided. By the tenor of the conversation, these were Stewart’s friends. Especially the shorter of the two strong-chinned, slender, black-haired men, who bore a superficial resemblance to one another. The final man was African-American, muscular and athletic, handsome in a rugged rather than a Tiger Woods sort of way. Familiar, too—but everybody looks like somebody famous, in Vegas.
“Stewart,” I called, and held out my hand as the little group drew abreast of me and started to pass me by.
Stewart blinked and turned to me, a thin vertical line between his eyes. “I beg your pardon. Do I know you?” he asked, and my heart thumped once in my chest and went still.
It wasn’t him. It could have been, from fifteen feet. From close enough to shake his hand, however . . . no. Not quite. Not the face, and not the faint European accent and subtle precision of pronunciation.
“No,” I said, and backed away. “I beg your pardon. But you look very much like someone I—”
I used to know.
I turned on the heel of my Doc and went back to the restaurant, cursing myself for failing to follow the vampire instead. Cursing myself for the hope I’d felt, however briefly, and for the fresh sharpness of the broken ache in my chest.
I knew who they were now; the penny had dropped.
Not just not Stewart.
Ghosts. More ghosts, summoned up out of the collective unconscious, called up out of the soup of story. I shook my head, sat down in my still-warm chair, and looked up into the eyes of the memory of two dead men.
At least I’d thought of something the John Henrys could do to help until I figured out how to manage Angel, immaterial or not. I bet they could be pretty good at keeping track of a vampire, if they were careful, and stayed out of sight.
Meanwhile, I could try to figure out what it was that I’d summoned home to Vegas. A namesake rite wasn’t supposed to work that way—and I shouldn’t have had the power to do it, even if it did. I was starting to think I’d managed to call home every ghost—media, legendary, and the “little” ghosts, the ghosts of the unquiet dead, like Bugsy out there—with even the vaguest of connections to my city.
That could get confusing.
Especially if two or three Howard Hugheses showed up.
Tribute and the Streetwalker with a Heart of Gold.
Las Vegas, Summer, 2002.
It was full dark by the time I left the mint-green glow of the MGM Grand behind me and walked north, counting the cracks in the
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