Sympathy for the Devil (10 page)

The woman was tall, with red hair and rather severe good looks that reminded Greene of Sister Mary Boniface, a nun he'd had a crush on as a boy. He immediately felt attracted to her, and, because of the kind of man he was, instantly distrusted the attraction.

"Mr. Green," she said with a measured smile. "It's good of you to come." She did not offer to shake hands.

Greene's answering smile was equally controlled. "I'm afraid that goodness had nothing to do with it, but the thousand dollars, your pardon, I should say the
non-refundable
thousand dollars, did play a considerable role in my decision." His voice was slow and measured, rich with the honeyed accent of the American South. Continuing to look at her, Greene tilted his head a little to one side. "But I do believe you have the advantage of me, madam."

She put her briefcase down on the bed. "No, I don't," she said matter-of-factly, and let the smile turn cold. "You recognized me the moment I walked in; I could see it in your face. It's just as well, really - if you were so out of touch with things as to
not
recognize me, then I very much doubt that I would have any use for your services, and this little interview would already be over."

After a few seconds, he bowed his head forward an inch or two. "Well, now, it would appear that you've skewered me rather nicely. I must either admit to having been guilty of some slight prevarication, or disqualify myself from the enviable opportunity to become associated, even if only professionally, with a lovely and charmin' - and, may I say,
clever
- lady such as yourself."

"While you're solving your dilemma, which I'm afraid you'll have to do within the next thirty seconds, perhaps you can answer a question for me."

He gestured graciously. "I am at your disposal, madam."

"Is that genteel accent and manner of yours for real? Or do you have a DVD of
Gone with the Wind
at home that's about to wear out from overuse?"

He did not seem to take offense. "Oh, I believe that I can lay honest claim to my rather quaint way of speakin'. You see, although I was born in rural Louisiana, in what some folks around those parts uncharitably refer to as 'cracker country,' my mother, rest her soul, insisted that I spend most of my formative years in a Catholic boarding school in New Orleans." He paused to brush the hair out of his eyes. "The good Sisters, I'm afraid, had some rather old-fashioned notions about Southern gentlemen and how they ought to conduct themselves. And since their punishments for what they considered improper speech and behavior tended to be both painful and humiliating, a Southern gentleman is what I became - in my speech and manners, at any rate."

"I see," she said, and glanced at her watch.

"However," he continued, "since those sheltered days of my youth, I have had occasion to experience rather more of the world and its ways, such that -" He paused, then went on, in a flat tone that contained no trace of accent whatever, unless East Coast Bitter can be considered an accent "- such that I can pretty much employ whatever lingo the situation calls for. And if this is the way you'd prefer to talk business, Ms. Doyle, you'll find that it's okay with me."

She nodded, as if to herself, then gestured toward the room's only armchair. "Why don't we sit down?"

Mary Margaret Doyle took a seat on the edge of the bed and opened her briefcase. As she rummaged inside, she asked, "Why did you say at first that you didn't recognize me?"

"I wanted to see what you were going to call yourself. If you used your own name, fine. If not, I'd know who you were anyway, and you wouldn't know that I knew."

"Even if it had worked, it's a pretty small advantage."

"Several small ones can add up to one big one. Sometimes, anyway."

She nodded again, and Greene thought he perceived a small measure of satisfaction in the movement. "So, where did you lose the Tennessee Williams accent?" she asked. "At Dartmouth?"

"That's right, although I didn't so much lose it as pick up a second one."

"You were involved in politics there, weren't you? Student politics, I mean."

"I never ran for anything myself, but I managed a couple of campaigns for friends of mine who wanted to be Student Body President, in different years."

"They won, didn't they? Both of them."

"They did, yes."

There were allegations, afterward, of certain... improprieties on your part."

"An allegation," he said primly, "is, by definition, a claim made without proof to back it up."

"Yes, to be sure." The set of her mouth had changed subtly, suggesting amusement. "After Dartmouth, it was Harvard Law School?"

"For a while, yes."

"You left when, exactly?"

"Middle of my second year."

"Not for academic reasons, surely?"

"No, not hardly," he said. "I received a job offer that was too good to resist, so I didn't - resist, that is. That's what all this
auld lang syne
is leading up to, I assume? A job offer?"

"That remains to be seen," she replied coolly. "Now, tell me about this offer you received at Harvard. Who made it?"

"A guy I'd met through my roommate. He was from Texas, originally, and the guy he introduced me to had started making a name for himself in political circles down there. By the time I knew him, he was a major player, even though he was only five or six years older than me."

"His name was..."

"Karl Rove."

"George W. Bush's personal Machiavelli? How interesting! What kind of position did he have in mind for you?"

"I don't think there ever was a formal job description. So I asked him, 'Karl just what are you hiring me to do?' And he looks at me, and this big grin spreads across his face, and he says, 'Whatever is necessary, boy. Whatever is necessary.'"

"And so you took the job."

"Yes, and I spent the year 2000 doing whatever Karl Rove thought was necessary. Officially, I was assigned to what's called 'Opposition Research.'"

"Is that a synonym for what used to be called 'dirty tricks'?"

"I'm sure I wouldn't know," he said.

"Well, you must have been good at it, since it launched your career as a... political consultant. So, what did you do for W's campaign?"

"There were actually a couple things that I'm -"

"Briefly, if you please." She was looking at her watch.

"All right," he said tightly. "How about one word? Do you think that might be
brief
enough for you?"

"That would depend on the word, wouldn't it?"

"Then suppose you try this one:
Florida
."

"The state that decided the election."

"That's the one."

She leaned forward, for the first time. "The Democrats demanded a recount."

"Indeed they did. And a Federal District judge agreed with them, much to the dismay of Jim Baker, whom Daddy Bush sent down to handle things. You never
heard
such language."

You might be surprised,
she thought. Then, aloud: "The Supreme Court overturned the ruling though, didn't they? They stopped the recount, and, since Bush was ahead, he was declared the winner. Game over."

"Exactly."

"You're not telling me that you got to somebody on the Court?"

He gave her a tiny smile. "No, that was reaching a little too high, even for Karl. Or me."

"What, then?"

"The Supreme Court's ruling was based on the conclusion that the recount process was unreliable. Machines were breaking down, ballots were getting lost. In some places, every vote for Gore was challenged as soon as it was counted. The Court had it right: it
was
a mess."

"And that was you."

"Me, and a few guys I brought down with me. And some local help that we picked up. We had no shortage of cash to spread around."

"So, you screwed up the recount, giving the Justices..."

"The excuse that some of them were looking for. Just because we couldn't get to the Court directly doesn't mean that the Bushes didn't have friends there."

She nodded. There was silence in the room for a few seconds, then Mary Margaret Doyle said, "Valerie Plame."

If she was expecting a reaction, the only one she got was a slow raising of Nestor Greene's eyebrows. "Yes? What about her?"

"During the run-up to the Iraq war, somebody leaked that she was CIA. The White House's revenge for the Op-Ed her husband wrote, claiming that the 'weapons of mass destruction' were a myth."

"Yes, I remember."

"That was you, wasn't it?"

The gentleman planter accent was back as Nestor Greene said, with a smile, "I have no knowledge of any such operation or activity, madam. Nor, if I had, would I be presently disposed to discuss it."

"
What's this - a holy gangbang? Oh, what fun!
"

As before, none of them responded to the taunts, and once the girl was secured, Hannigan began the ritual again. Morris thought that the priest may have been right about the demon's hold beginning to loosen. Its blasphemies were fewer this time, and uttered with somewhat less enthusiasm.

When it came time for the sprinkling of holy water, Hannigan did what he had done all the other times. He removed the wand-like
aspergillum
from the small silver bucket holding the holy water (the
aspersorium
) and shook it over the girl's form. But this time, the circular tip came loose and flew under its own momentum a short distance through the air to land softly on the girl's stomach.

Hannigan stopped chanting and made that small, annoyed sound with his tongue again. He closed the prayer book after marking the page with a ribbon, and came around the bed.

What happened next took only a few seconds, but had several discrete, identifiable steps - identifiable, that is, after it was too late.

One:
Susan Kowal's head turned toward Morris. In a voice that was an exact match for Libby Chastain's, it said, "Quincey!"

Two:
Without thinking, Morris turned and looked at the girl. Like all of them, he'd had a long and stress-filled day, and was not at his most alert.

Three
: Morris locked eyes with Susan Kowan, and those eyes were not human at all. What he saw in them cannot be described in words, but an approximation would be to say that Quincey Morris was given a brief, unfiltered glimpse of Hell.

Four
: Rev. Paul Hannigan reached the side of the bed where Morris knelt and bent forward, reaching for the small sphere that was the sprinkler's tip.

Five
: Susan Kowal's form twisted slightly away from Morris's side of the bed, causing the sprinkler tip to roll off her chest unto the bed, on the side opposite where Hannigan was now bending over.

Six:
The scar on Morris's neck began to burn, far more painfully than it had that wild night in Idaho when he had been touched by Hellfire. To Morris, it felt as if a red-hot branding iron were being applied to the side of his neck - and then it got worse.

Seven:
Hannigan, seeing where the tip had gone, did what anyone else would have done in such circumstances - he leaned a little farther forward, so that he could reach across Susan Kowal.

Eight:
Morris, with a grunt of agony, released his grip on Susan Kowal's right arm and clutched the site of the burn on his neck.

Nine:
With the speed and determination of a striking black mamba, Susan Kowal's right hand, two fingers extended, streaked toward the priest's face, less than two feet away.

Ten:
those straight, rigid fingers reached Paul Hannigan's eyeballs - and kept right on going.

Chapter 9

Peters stared at the man sitting across from him. "Who are you?
What
are you?"

"You have no memory at all, do you?"

"Not of anything before the last half hour or so." Peters looked up at the other's deceptively benign face. "I've been getting flashes. Faces. Sounds - screaming, mostly. Otherwise, I can't remember shit. I've been looking through the stuff in my wallet - at least, I assume it's mine, since my picture's on the driver's license. But it might as well be something I found on the street. None of it means anything to me."

The 'priest' nodded slowly. "Yes, we were afraid of that. It's so rare to send one of you back, we weren't sure how the transition would affect you. One theory held that you'd arrive incurably insane, although it seems that's been avoided, at least. Those among the brethren who might know the effects for certain are precisely the ones we couldn't ask, lest they find out about our little... project."

Peters held his head in both hands, as if afraid it was about to explode. "Look, if you're trying to drive me crazy, congratulations - 'cause you're well on the way. If you want something from me, and I guess you do, you'll have to explain it in terms that I can understand. For pity's sake -"

The priest gave a laugh that was utterly devoid of humor. "You're speaking to the wrong one about pity, I'm afraid."

"So, that means you're... the Devil?"

The other sighed heavily. "I'd forgotten what stupid creatures you Eve-spawn are, since I rarely converse with any of you, back in my domain. Do you actually think yourself worthy to receive the attention of the Lord of Darkness, you impudent maggot?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't -"

"I am Astaroth, a Crowned Prince of the Netherworld. If we were back there, you would address me as Lord Astaroth. But one shouldn't stand on formality on this side, I suppose."

"So, 'back there' is Hell?"

"There may be hope for you yet. Yes, Hell, Gehenna, Pandemonium, Hades - 'where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched.'"

"That sounds like a quote, the last part."

"It is. Mark 9:48, to be precise. Now let us move on to more important matters."

"Matters like what I'm doing here."

"Exactly. You were sent back because we - some of us - thought you could be useful. In your first sojourn on this plane, after all, you were a professional murderer."