The Last American Wizard

by Edward Irving

  When he saw Steve’s confused look, he explained. “That’s ‘Old Gangsters.’ No, my time with the MS-13 was going to come to an end pretty soon even without my becoming the cadejo, so it’s a good time to consider a change of career.”

  “If you’re looking for something new,” Ace asked, “why hook up with us? One idiot after another has been trying to kill us ever since we left Bowie.”

  “Well, Hosteen thought that it probably wasn’t wise to move completely out of my comfort area.” Carlos looked thoughtful. “I’m used to people trying to kill me. If I went into, say, hedge fund management, it would require significant changes in both strategy and tactics.”

  “Wait a minute.” Steve stopped walking and stared at the tattooed young man. “Where do you get off talking like an MBA? You were a cheap thug selling drugs in a bad neighborhood yesterday. Is this some sort of joke by the Trickster here?”

  Coyote just grinned and shook his head.

  Carlos said, “First, I was never a ‘cheap’ thug–our chapter had the highest sales performance in the entire Middle Atlantic region. On the other hand, you’re right; I don’t have a master’s–yet–but I did get my bachelor’s in business administration at the Smith School in College Park, and anyway, you never heard me talk at all yesterday. I did some moaning and barking, I guess, but no talking.”

  “Well, then why were you running a gang in Bowie?”

  “Did you notice a lot of other opportunities?” Carlos waited a second and then nodded. “I didn’t think so. Me neither. I’d joined up with the Mara Salvatrucha 13 as a kid and I kept up appearances during the day and took all my courses at night. When I decided it was time, it wasn’t all that hard to engineer a C-level management change. A hostile takeover, you might say.”

  “I’ll bet it was hostile,” Ace murmured.

  “Hey, everything I did was standard practice in that particular professional sector,” Carlos said. “If I’m moving into a new industry, I’ll change my management style appropriately. By the way, Hosteen hasn’t told me very much about you two. What business are you in?”

  Ace just shrugged and jerked her head at Steve. “Ask him; he’s the brains of the outfit.”

  Steve thought for a second. “Finding and killing the terrorists who dropped a plane filled with people into Fort Meade, keeping the number of other malicious bastards with magical powers to a reasonable minimum, and enjoying as many good beers and great TV shows as possible when time permits. That sound about right, Ace?”

  “Not getting in some beach time is a deal-breaker for me.”

  “OK, amend that to ‘enjoying as many good beers, great TV shows, and quality days at the beach as possible.’ That better?”

  “Yeah,” Ace admitted. “I still think we’ve left out some things, mostly involved with staying alive and at least somewhat sane, but we can always add them in later.”

  “Details,” Steve said with a dismissive wave. “Life and sanity are the least of our problems–primarily because it’s extremely unlikely that we’ll keep either for very long.”

  Send Money vibrated and Steve pulled him out of the belt clip so he could read the screen.

  KEEP THE BATTERY AT ALL TIMES TO BREAK UP

  “Huh?”

  KEEPING THE BATTERY UP TOP AT ALL TIMES.

  “I think you mean ‘topped up.’ That’s exceptionally reasonable and we’ll work it in,” Steve said magnanimously. “Anyone else? Barnaby, we haven’t heard from you.”

  “For once,” Ace said.

  “I’ll refrain from any comment in deference to the Master Chief,” Barnaby said, sounding huffy. “Even though there are several issues I’ve been considering, including making the unplugging of a sentient computer a felony, regulating issues of ownership and inheritance in the case of a singularity, and finding a sane entity willing to get the vicious piranhas from the CYBERWAR division under some semblance of control. A leash law, perhaps. However, as I said, I won’t seek to voice my legitimate concerns, because the lethal blonde over there thinks I talk too much.”

  “You?” Steve widened his eyes in a semblance of shock. “You talk too much? A vile calumny. Quite possibly a good case for a legal charge of slander.” He turned back to Carlos. “I hope that answered your question.”

  “Of course. You guys are private investigators,” Carlos said confidently. “What will you call the company?”

  “Barnaby & O’Malley,” Steve answered instantly. Ace frowned. “Who is O’Malley?”

  “In the original comic strip, he was Barnaby’s fairy godfather. Stood about three feet high, always wore a double-breasted suit and a fedora, smoked cheroots, and had tiny wings on his back that I don’t think he ever used,” Steve explained. “He was a card- carrying member of Elves, Leprechauns, Gnomes, and Little Men’s Chowder & Marching Society. I probably got at least part of that wrong.”

  “OK, I’ll bite,” Ace said. “Why would we have an outdated comic strip character as a partner in our PI business?”

  “If there are calls we don’t want to deal with, we’ll just transfer them to Mr. O’Malley’s line and let them quietly expire from lack of interest.” Steve paused for a second. “As a matter of fact, the same goes for Mr. Barnaby, unless he feels like answering for some reason. Either way, our names aren’t listed anywhere, and we can always claim to be innocent of whatever we’re guilty of.”

  “Won’t you need a nonexistent lawyer?” Carlos asked.

  “Who better than Crockett Johnson?” Barnaby said. “It was the pen name of David Leisk, who drew the strip. He started out writing for the Communists, so a name change was a pretty logical move when he needed to scrape up a paycheck. Wait a second…OK, he’s registered as a member of the DC Bar with a long history of being difficult to find.”

  “Where’s the office?” Ace asked.

  “Right here,” Steve answered as he waved them over to a FedEx office just before the corner with Pennsylvania Avenue.

  “Sorry, folks, but this is where I get off,” Coyote said. “This is one of the many joints that have 86’d me and I need to get going anyway.”

  Ace just stared at him–clearly the concept of being banned from a copy and shipping center was difficult to grasp. Coyote waved as he continued up Third Street and Steve ushered Ace and Carlos through the front door. From the front door, they walked straight through and out the back door, exchanging nods with the staff.

  As he held the back door open, Steve said, “This was cooler when it was a Chinese laundry.”

  “Had to be,” Ace said.

  Out the back door, there was a small alley with the obligatory garbage dumpsters and assorted debris. Just past the second green recycling bin, a door to the left had a grimy stained-glass window with “Lord Telford’s” spelled out in green shards. Steve confidently opened the door and revealed a small pub-style bar– much longer than it was wide. There was only enough room for a length of polished oak and a row of stools in the center, but there were a few tables on each end.

  “Welcome to DC’s greatest and grumpiest bar,” Steve said. “There’s no sign on the street,” Ace noted. “How does anyone find this place?”

  Steve indicated the strong-looking woman with orange hair behind the bar. “Angie doesn’t want just anyone to show up, so it works out fine. It used to be behind the bathrooms at Tucson Cantina up at Connecticut and Calvert until that became a sushi bar and she decided to relocate. Hey, Angie. These two are friends of mine; is it OK if they drop by from time to time?”

  The bartender gave Ace and Carlos a long inspection and then turned away. Steve nodded happily. “Great. You’ll find Angie to be a woman of very few words, but the two she uses the most are ‘get’ and ‘out,’ so you’ve passed the entrance exam. Luckily, the bagpiper isn’t here, so why don’t we grab some beers and plan our attack on the Illuminati?”

  “The bagpiper?” Steve was amazed how Ace could pack such a toxic mixture of hatred, horror, and contempt in just two words, so he gave
the only possible response.

  He shrugged.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  When they had gone far enough to penetrate the gloom in the back of the bar, Steve spotted Old Howard sitting at a table with his back to them. He walked up and clapped him on the shoulder– or he would have if the man weren’t a ghost. As it was, his hand slammed all the way down to the tabletop and he gracelessly fell forward–feeling that intense cold that every good paranormal reality show describes at least three times.

  Old Howard calmly took another drink of his beer.

  Steve managed to turn his faceplant into a graceless but effective slide into the adjoining chair. “How can you hold a glass and drink a beer but I can’t touch you?”

  “I want to hold the glass and drink the beer.”

  “Well, that makes sense.” Steve’s voice took on a mock-angry tone. “Hey, what happened to you out at the cemetery? I felt like General Custer, all alone and surrounded by the enemy.”

  Ace sat down as Carlos went to get some beers from the bar. “Is that why you started yelling, ‘Take no prisoners!’?”

  “Shut up; you were unconscious,” Steve said. “As a matter of fact, you’d gone all to pieces before I could even say, ‘Man, something sphinx around here.’”

  Old Howard peered at Steve. “I get cashiered for a bit of roistering about, and you get away with jokes like that? The world ain’t fair.”

  Barnaby spoke from Steve’s belt. “Or, in your case, the afterworld.”

  “True.” The ghost finished his beer and Steve waved to Carlos, who was still waiting at the bar, to bring another. Old Howard nodded his thanks and asked, “So, what suicidal adventure brings you to my little corner of the Capital?”

  “We’re not quite sure yet,” Ace said. “That’s why we’re here. A beer or two always makes suicidal battle plans sound much less suicidal.”

  Carlos arrived with a National Bohemian for the ghost and put down a trio of Guinness pints. Steve looked at the dark beer with affection and said, “I’ll bet you didn’t order this very often in Bowie.”

  “No, and that makes it taste all the better.”

  Steve unclipped the smartphone from his belt and laid it in the center of the table. “OK, I guess we’ve got a quorum, so why don’t we run over the facts as we know them?”

  Barnaby said, “More than four hundred innocent people were sacrificed to a dragon, probably Ouroboros, which Carl Jung defined as the symbol of alchemy and magic in the human unconscious–”

  Steve interrupted. “Wait; there are two points of order we need to address before all that...”

  “Really?”

  “One. You promised me five hundred dollars a day–and today’s fee is due.” Ace reached into a back pocket and handed over a folded stack of bills. “Two. I can remember…well, ‘feeling’ isn’t really the right word, but it will have to do–’feeling’ the minds of three homicidal maniacs while simultaneously living through the traumatic mixture of terror, religious fervor, and love that made up the last moments of their victims.”

  “You needed to get today’s pay before you got around to mentioning something that important?” Ace said acidly.

  “No, but there was a slight possibility that I would have forgotten about the money, and I didn’t want to take the chance.” Steve slid the bills into his shirt pocket. “Back to the three homicidal nutballs on the plane. Their thoughts were ice-cold and radiated blazing power at the same time. The Illuminati we met in Bowie and Bladensburg weren’t anything near as powerful as these people. So, even the sacrifice was not done by the Illuminati.”

  “I believe I already pointed that out,” Barnaby said. “And nothing happened in Bladensburg,” Ace snapped.

  “Right you are, Master Chief. Just forget I said that,” Steve said quickly. “Anyway, tall, red, and ugly also said the Illuminati weren’t the ones who’d hired him when he was chitchatting with Ace at the Tune Inn,” Steve said. “However, we really don’t have much to go on except Weltschmerz and his buddies, so I guess we still need to go up to their place in Meridian Hill Park if we want to find out any more.”

  Ace nodded. “Sounds like a plan.”

  “Thanks, but it’s really more of a bad idea. I’m counting on you for the plan.” Steve continued. “First, let’s step back a bit. I’m confused about the whole Masonic thing. I thought they were a bunch of fat car dealers who dressed up in robes and got drunk once a week. When did they get so powerful?”

  “Who knows?” Ace gestured to the phone in the middle of the table with her glass and said, “Barnaby?”

  “Master Chief, you’ve taken both the Basic and Advanced courses in the American Occult at the War College, so you know perfectly well. However, since I cannot join you in a beverage, I suppose I could provide the others with a bit of background before they face almost-certain death in the Katakomben der Illuminati.”

  Steve coughed up a lungful of Guinness. “Almost-certain WHAT?”

  Ace pounded him on the back–a bit more enthusiastically than Steve felt was truly necessary–and Barnaby continued. “OK, would ‘likely’ death make you feel better? I can’t help the odds we calculate over here. The Illuminati are going to be tough. Masons were integral to the creation of the United States–both here and in France. In Europe, they still see the Revolution as primarily a Masonic operation.”

  “Where did you get that from?” Steve asked.

  “An old Art Buchwald column. Don’t interrupt so much.” Barnaby paused and then continued. “Anyway, Washington was a Grand Master; he took the presidential oath in a Masonic lodge; Benjamin Franklin and seven other signers of the Declaration were Masons, as were over half of Washington’s generals. You’d have to be blind not to see how Meridian Hill, the Temple of the Scottish Rite, the White House, and the current Masonic Center over in Alexandria line up, and yes, L’Enfant put all sorts of symbols and angles into his original street design for Washington.”

  Carlos said, “Didn’t someone just write a book about all that?”

  “They’ve been writing books about the symbolism of DC since about five minutes after it was designed,” Barnaby said acerbically. “Now, there is no doubt that some, probably the vast majority of Masons are good people: egalitarian, against oppression of all kinds–I mean, they wrote the documents this nation is founded on, for Pete’s sake–but there have always been accusations of immorality, an anti-Christian bias, and black magic. The Hellfire Club’s ‘do what thou wilt’ philosophy, Crowley’s openly satanic shenanigans, and even the Templars’ wealth. That’s why so many nations have tried to stamp them out at one point or another.”

  “Why does anyone even care about them?” Steve asked. “All that secret society stuff is dying out, isn’t it?”

  “You got that wrong,” Carlos said. “Every musician from Kanye to Ke$sha has Illuminati symbols in their videos and lyrics.”

  “Yeah, but so does Madonna,” Ace said. “Anything she does is automatically outdated and irrelevant.”

  Carlos seemed surprised but nodded in agreement after a moment of thought.

  “May I continue?” Barnaby asked. “We care because the period we’re in now is unusual. It’s really only been since the early 1960s that membership in these groups has dropped off. Is it really because your generation is all that smart, or just that you’ve traded a belief in the supernatural for an equally irrational belief in science and technology?”

  Steve asked, “Two questions: How can you have an irrational belief about being rational?”

  “Don’t interrupt. I’m on a roll.”

  Steve could have sworn that the computer took a deep breath like an orator heading for the finish. Then the voice paused. “What was the second question?”

  Steve grinned and asked, “Are you channeling Wikipedia?”

  A growl came out of the phone speaker. It ran up and down the scale twice, and then Barnaby’s voice came back as if nothing happened. “In the end, we go with the known facts. A drago
n ate the plane. The Illuminati who almost took you prisoner had what certainly appeared to be magical powers. Along with immortality, astral observation, and a profound knowledge of pre-Change mysticism–”

  “They do know how to throw a mean fireball,” Ace interrupted. She tossed her bottle into a recycling bin across the room. “After that endless harangue, three facts still remain: someone magically killed a planeload of innocent people, and the Illuminati are the only group that we know that had something to do with it.”

  “What’s number three?” Steve asked.

  “We’ve been sitting around too long and it’s time to kick some ass.” Ace got up. “It’s a standard operating plan. Blow some things up, kill the people you know deserve it, and generally make trouble. Usually, that results in the opposition’s next level coming around to see if they can’t shut us up, permanently.”

  Old Howard belched loudly and said, “I’ve always liked that plan myself. Worked like a charm against the Moros back in the Philippines.”

  Steve looked at the ghost dubiously. “I thought you had to invent the .45 pistol because you couldn’t stop the Moros.”

  “True, but that proves the point. Browning would never have made the sale to the Army if we hadn’t gone over there and caused a ruckus.”

  Steve stood up. “Ace, does that make any sense?”

  “Nope. But neither does attacking the Illuminati. Come on, I’ve got to pick up some gear at the apartment.”

  When they got back to the small garage on 4th Street, Ace asked politely if Hans would open the trunk, and when he did, she took out a hefty-looking black duffle bag. Up in the penthouse suite, Carlos wandered around checking the place out and, Steve noticed, sniffing everything.

  Steve washed his face, combed what was left of his hair, and then sat down in the living room with a can of Olde Frothingslosh. He had no clue what to do to prepare for an assault on people who could throw fiery projectiles more than twenty miles. To stay alert, he played a game of Angry Birds against Send Money.