Morris and Chastain Investigations: Play With Fire & Midnight at the Oasis

by Justin Gustainis

  “If it’s a text, you can save it–”

  “Get me a fucking pen.”

  “Right.” Peters rolled out of bed and walked rapidly into the next room. In seconds, he was back with what she needed. “Here.”

  Ashley wrote on the back of the envelope, frequently consulting the phone’s screen. Then she put the pen down, studied the phone for a few moments, and pressed an icon. Satisfied, she put the phone on the nightstand.

  “I know you can save a text message, and I just did,” she told Peters, “but I also know that if you press the wrong button, it’s gone forever. I’m not familiar with this phone, and couldn’t afford a mistake. This message gets lost, and I’m royally fucked. Or, rather, we are.”

  “Are you gonna show me, or what?”

  “Of course,” she said, handing him the phone. “There should be another message coming any second, though. This one is incomplete.”

  Peters stared at the little screen and read:

  “There is 1 like U, sent 2 open Gates of Tartarus. Spell in Corpus Hermeticum. Ritual calls 4 burning churches & shamans + big sacrifice center. U must sto”

  He handed the phone back to Ashley and said, “We better hope there’s another one on the way, because this message is clear as mud.”

  “It’s not quite that bad,” she told him. “But, like you said, I sure hope there’s more. There’s a lot that I still need to know.”

  “I assume the last word here is intended to be ‘stop.’ Why didn’t he at least finish the word, you figure?”

  She picked up the phone and looked at the text message again. “He hit one hundred and sixty characters,” she said.

  He stared at her. “You mean Hell has to follow the rules of some stupid phone company? That’s fucking ridiculous!”

  “The whole idea of a text from Hell is absurd – but here it is, nonetheless. Why would someone in Hell use Earth technology?” She spread her hands wide. “No idea. Why didn’t he just show up here and give us orders personally? He did when you were first sent here, right?”

  “Yeah,” Peters said. “He took on the aspect of a kindly old Catholic priest. Astaroth likes his little jokes.”

  “Whatever’s going on, this doesn’t look like a joke.”

  “You know what the Gates of Tartarus is? And the Corpus Hermeticum?”

  “Yes to the first, and I learned of the second quite recently,” she said. “But before I start with the explanations, let’s wait for the next text. With any luck, it’ll explain some things.”

  But there was no second text from the demon Astaroth. They waited for almost ten minutes in silence before Ashley said, “Well, fuck me, anyway.”

  “Gladly,” Peters said. “But first I want you to tell me about the stuff that’s in that text.”

  “I guess that’s all we have to go on – for now, at least. If he can send one fucking text, why can’t he send another one? Damn, that pisses me off!”

  “I’d say you’re beautiful when you’re angry, but the truth is you’re scarier than shit. Calm down a little, will you, babe?”

  Her expression made him wonder if she was about to eviscerate him with the pen she was holding. Then she grinned and said, “Shit is scary? That doesn’t mean we’re giving up anal sex, does it?”

  “Not on my account,” he said. “But let’s stay out of the gutter for ten minutes while you tell me about the Gates of whatever it was.”

  “The Gates of Tartarus.” She went over to the bed and sat down next to him. “There is a legend in Hell–”

  “Wait – Hell has legends?”

  “Any society has its legends,” she said, “and the society of the damned is like any other. Well, okay, not like any other – but, yes, legends. Now stop interrupting.”

  “Yes, dear.”

  She delivered a slap to his bare thigh that was more painful than playful.

  “So, the legend of the Gates of Tartarus says that there is a way out of Hell – not to Heaven, which is forever closed to us, but to Earth, world of the hated humans, who were responsible for our Great Rebellion in the first place.”

  “Responsible? What the fuck did we do?”

  Another stinging slap. “I told you not to interrupt. Humans are believed responsible because it is your very existence that offended certain angels, especially Lucifer, who was high among the angelic hierarchy. The idea that the Father, against Lucifer’s advice, would create a race of... apes with souls was unbearably offensive to some of us who had existed as pure spirits since time began.”

  “Apes with souls, huh?”

  She didn’t hit him this time. “My view of humanity – well, certain parts of it, anyway – has undergone some revision since the time of the Great Rebellion. But many of the Fallen have not changed, and would love nothing better than to lay waste to humanity and everything it has created.”

  She picked up the envelope on which she had written Astaroth’s text message. “If you want to talk about things that are scary, there are a couple of things in this message which should scare you down to the insides of your bones. The first fact is that the Gates of Tartarus are apparently not just legend – they really exist.”

  She turned and looked at Peters, and the expression on her face frightened him more than anything that had already transpired this evening. “The second fact – if I’m reading this right – is that someone from Hell has been sent to this side and given flesh, as I was. And this individual is apparently charged with throwing those gates wide open. The result, if he succeeds, will be, quite literally, Hell on Earth.”

  “Great,” he said. “Just great. If I won’t go to Hell, then they’ll bring Hell to me. But what about this other thing–” he consulted the envelope “–the Corpus Hermeticum?”

  “That,” she said, “represents the only piece of good news to come out of this mess, so far.”

  Thirty-Six

  THEIR SUITE AT the Charles Hotel had a view of the river, and Libby Chastain stood at the window looking moodily down at the water as she wondered whether there was any way the call she’d made to the police could be traced back to her.

  Public phones are fast disappearing in the cellular age, but there are some left – including the one in Harvard Square they’d found a block from Adelson’s.

  With Morris standing nearby to keep anyone from getting close enough to overhear, Libby had used a minor bit of magic, to change her voice, and called 911.

  “Emergency operator. How may I assist you?”

  “Yeah, uh, listen – I just went into Adelson’s bookstore in Harvard Square,” she said in a soprano voice that was nothing like her usual alto. She gave herself a Boston accent, as well. “There’s a guy in there, dead.”

  “Can I get your name please, ma’am?”

  “There’s a lot of blood,” Libby said, and hung up.

  She and Morris had decided that it was better for the police to find the carnage at Adelson’s, instead of some family member, so they’d left the front door unlocked when they left. The sight of Mister Schwartz’s body would lead the cops to search the place, and to discover the two corpses downstairs.

  The 911 system would do an automatic trace, but Morris and Chastain would be long gone before anyone got around to looking. Libby had worn gloves, so fingerprints were not an issue, and they had checked that no surveillance cameras were trained on that area of the Square. Libby decided there was no way the call could come back to bite her, and she was glad she’d made it.

  From the couch behind her, Morris said, “Unless Adelson was more heavily involved in occult stuff than he let on, that werewolf was sent after us. So, what I’m hung up on are the usual two questions that arise when somebody comes after us.”

  Without turning from the window, Libby said, “You mean ‘who’ and ‘why?’”

  “Them’s the ones. A hit attempt usually means that we’re getting too close for somebody’s comfort. But I can’t figure how what we’ve got now would bother anybody.”


  Libby turned and looked at him. “We’ve got the Corpus Hermeticum – four-fifths of it, anyway.”

  “And if the buyer wanted those other four volumes, he could have got them from Adelson. But all he wanted was volume five, and that’s what he’s got.”

  “He’s got the book he wanted, and we’ve got shit,” Libby said. “But maybe he believes we have more?”

  “Where would he get an idea like that? Hell, how would the sumbitch even know we’re looking? We didn’t exactly call a press conference.”

  “All right, let’s list the people who know we’re investigating the book theft. Father Bowen, who’s so embarrassed by it all, he’s not likely to tell anybody.”

  “Agreed. Then there’s the occult burglar, Sutorius. He knows we’re after the book, because he told us he stole it, and who he stole it for.”

  “But Sutorius only knows Adelson, who was his client,” Libby said. “And Adelson was surprised when we confronted him, Quincey. He didn’t know who we were, or what we were after – I’ll stake my reputation on it.”

  Libby saw that Morris was scratching his chin, his eyes distant. “What?” she asked.

  “Sutorius only knew Adelson as his client,” Morris said, “but I bet he knows a lot of people in the occult world. Shit, he’d have to. Could be he’s looking for payback.”

  “So he did what – put the word out that we’re after the book?”

  “He might’ve. And maybe the word reached the ears of Mister Theron Ware.”

  “Theron Ware... there’s something about that,” Libby said, frowning. “When Adelson used it in his office, I remember a small bell going off in my head. I’ve come across the name before, but I couldn’t for the life of me tell you where.”

  “Well, we can do what everybody else does when they want to know something.” Morris opened his laptop and turned it on.

  “You’re Googling ‘Theron Ware?’” Libby sounded amused.

  “Why not?” Morris said, watching the boot-up sequence on his screen. “Can’t do any harm. But first, I want to check out a couple of people who are near and dear to my heart. See if anybody’s been talking about ’em recently.”

  “You and me, in other words.”

  “The very same. Okay, let’s see here.”

  A few seconds later, he said, “Well there’s a whole bunch of stuff about me, stemming from that mess at the Republican Convention last year.”

  “Not surprising.”

  “Not fun, either. I thought it might help business, at first – and I have gotten a lot of calls at the business number. Trouble is, most of ’em are either reporters or nuts who want me to find out if Aunt Edna is really in Heaven.”

  “I’ve been spared those – mostly,” she said.

  “That’s because you were smart enough to keep your name out of the papers. Okay, let’s try ‘Morris’ and ‘Chastain’ together.”

  He scrolled through a list of results, then stopped. “Uh-oh.”

  “Good news or bad?”

  “Hard to tell. Listen to this, from the Branch Report, about a week ago:

  “Sources inside the Justice Department have revealed that ‘occult investigator’ Quincey Morris, who was mysteriously freed from prison after facing a slew of federal charges stemming from the last RNC convention, has been hired by the FBI to investigate the series of fire bombings of churches and synagogues that have occurred over the last six weeks. Morris’s ‘partner,’ one Elizabeth Chastain, calls herself a ‘white witch.’ Maybe she can use some magic to keep Morris out of jail this time.”

  “My Goddess, what a snarky bastard!” Libby said. “And it’s not even true!”

  “From what I hear, truth and this fella are just passing acquaintances,” Morris said. “And as for snarky – that’s what makes him fun to read, according to some people.”

  “But the FBI hasn’t hired us. We told O’Donnell and Fenton that we couldn’t take on the church burnings until after we had finished tracking down the Corpus Hermeticum.”

  “Yeah, I know. And I can’t see either O’Donnell or Fenton telling this Frank Branch fella otherwise.”

  “Neither can I. Even if they were the type to do something like that, they’d have nothing to gain by it.”

  “Agreed. But the story’s out in cyberspace, regardless of how it got there. Before we get too excited about it, let’s see if anything else about us has shown up recently.”

  Morris spent twenty more minutes online, looking for anything that might connect him and Libby with the search for the purloined Corpus Hermeticum.

  “Nada,” he said, finally. “Not a goddamn thing.”

  Libby paced slowly around the room. “I suppose if Sutorius did rat us out, he didn’t have to do it online. He could have made a few phone calls to the right people.”

  “Yeah, I know. I’m almost tempted to have Ashley pay another call on him, but–”

  “Quincey.” She was glaring at him.

  Morris held up a pacifying hand. “Don’t get upset, Libby. I was about to say, ‘but I just don’t have the heart for it.’”

  “Me, neither,” Libby said, mollified. “Besides, even if we got some names from him, there’d be no way to know if those people hadn’t called others. It would be a waste of time.”

  “Speaking of names,” Morris said, “you wanted to check out Theron Ware.”

  “Might as well – although it might turn out to be just some guy I went to high school with.”

  “Let’s see.” Morris typed some more, and waited.

  “Okay, here you go,” he said. “According to our friends at Wikipedia, Theron Ware, in addition to being the name of an art gallery in Hudson, New York, is the title character in The Damnation of Theron Ware. It’s a novel, written in 1896 by a fella named Harold Frederic. Says here it’s considered a classic of American literature – but I don’t remember coming across it at Princeton.”

  “They weren’t teaching it at NYU either,” Libby said. “At least, not in the English classes I took.”

  “Anyway, Theron Ware is some kind of Methodist preacher who ends up in upstate New York, where he loses his faith but gains... I’m not sure what. It’s not really clear.”

  “Hmm. Not much joy there. Maybe I’m thinking of the art gallery, although I’ve never been – wait!”

  After a few seconds, his eyes on the screen, Morris said, “Theron Ware is also another fictional character, it seems. In a book by James Blish called Black Easter. Came out in 1968.”

  “James Blish sounds familiar,” Libby said. “Science fiction writer, right? Maybe that’s where I heard it.” She did not sound reassured.

  “In the novel, Theron Ware is the name of a black magician who is hired by some rich guy – to open the gates of Hell, for twenty-four hours.”

  “Is that right?” Libby’s voice held no affect whatsoever.

  “There’s a cross-reference here to Black Easter,” Morris said. “Give me a second.”

  Morris read the new entry, then said, “Yeah, that’s about it. Theron Ware is a wizard hired by some rich asshole who thinks it would be amusing to turn all the demons of Hell loose on Earth for one night. Problem is, when the time comes to send the demons back, they don’t wanna go, and Ware can’t make them. I gather this isn’t one of those stories with a happy ending.”

  “No,” Libby said in that same flat voice. “I imagine not.”

  Thirty-Seven

  “SO THIS OCCULT burglar type–” Peters began.

  “Sutorius,” Ashley said.

  “Right, Sutorius. He admitted, under duress, that he’d stolen the Corpus Hermeticum for some book dealer in Boston.”

  “Cambridge. Yes, and he spoke truthfully. I’d have known if he lied.”

  “So, I guess we need to talk to Morris and Chastain.”

  “Indeed. But knowledge is power – before I get in touch with the delectable Libby, let’s find out what we can about these church burnings. I saw a story about one on the news, but apart fro
m giving a brief cheer for the arsonist, I didn’t pay it a lot of attention. We don’t even know how many have been burned so far.”

  “That should be easy enough to find out,” Peters said. He turned toward the computer but then looked back. “Ashley.”

  “Forget it. I’m horny, too – but we just haven’t got time right now.”

  “That’s not what I was about to ask. When you mentioned cheering one of the church burnings, it kind of reminded me which side you’re really on. What does it matter to you whether somebody opens the Gates of Tartarus? I mean, if they succeed, I suppose you could look at what happened next as one big family reunion.”

  She sat back and looked at him, her normally mobile face hard to read.

  “Peters, you’ve been in Hell – not nearly as long as I have, but you’ve spent time there. Which do you prefer: there, or here?”

  “Here, of course. But then, I’m human. This side of the Great Divide is where I belong. It’s home. And here, nobody tortures me – apart from those times when you get a little frisky with the riding crop.”

  “You’re right about one thing: Hell is my home – or, at least it had been for so long that human time can’t even measure it. But that doesn’t mean I enjoyed being there. It’s supposed to be a place of punishment, remember? And it is, believe me.”

  “All right, I didn’t mean–”

  “I like it here, Peters. I like being able to see a sky that isn’t burning. I like the change of seasons. I like being the most powerful creature in my immediate environment. I like the sex. Sometimes, I even like you. I have no interest whatsoever in returning to Hell, nor do I wish Hell to join me here. Is that answer enough?”

  Peters nodded slowly. “Absolutely. Now let’s see about those church burnings.”

  Half an hour later, they had compiled a list containing the pertinent information.

  Feb. 2 – Duluth, MN. Catholic Church burned, with a priest inside. The body not completely consumed. Rumors about occult elements surrounding the priest’s death, but authorities aren’t talking.