"Move it!" I lowered my aim. "The first one goes through your kneecap. You'll use a cane for the rest of your life."

Krusemark did as he was told, dropping his leather satchel to the floor. I stepped behind him and frisked him down. He was clean. I got my bracelets out of my jacket pocket and clipped one cuff to his right wrist and the other to the rung he gripped. He faced me, and I backhanded him full strength across the mouth with my left.

"You filthy scum!" I jammed the muzzle of the .38 under his chin, forcing his head back. His eyes were wide as a trapped stallion's. "I'd like to spray your brains all over the wall, cocksucker."

"Have you gone m-mad?" he stammered.

"Mad? Goddamned right I'm mad. I've been mad ever since you set your goons on me."

"You're making a mistake."

"Bullshit! Everything you say is a crock of shit. Maybe if I rearrange some teeth, it'll help you remember." I grinned at him, exposing my temporary dental work. "Like your torpedoes did to me."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Sure you do. You set me up and now you're trying to save your ass. You've been lying since the first minute I met you. Edward Kelley is the name of an Elizabethan magician. That's why you used it as an alias, not because your daughter thought it was cute."

"You seem to know all about it."

"I've been doing some homework. I brushed up on my black magic. So save the crap about how the maid slipped your daughter the tarot cards when she was in knee socks. It was you all the time. You're the devil worshiper."

"I'd be a fool if I wasn't. The Prince of Darkness protects the powerful. You should pray to Him yourself, Angel. You'd be surprised at the good things that would happen."

"Like what? Slitting babies' throats? Where'd you snatch the kid from, Krusemark?"

He sneered at me. "There was no snatching involved. We paid hard cash for the little bastard. One less welfare mouth for the taxpayers to feed. You are a taxpayer, aren't you, Angel?"

I spit in his face. I'd never done that to anyone before. "A cockroach is the chosen of God alongside you. I don't feel a thing when I step on a roach, so stepping on you should be a pleasure. Let's start at the beginning. I want to know all about Johnny Favorite. The works. Everything you've ever seen or heard."

"Why should I? You won't kill me. You're too weak." He wiped the saliva off his cheek.

"I don't need to kill you. I can walk out of here and leave you hanging. How long do you think it would be before someone found you? Two days? A week? Two weeks? You can pass the time counting the trains go by."

Krusemark looked a little ashen, but he kept on bluffing. "What good would it do you?" The rest of it was lost in the roar of a passing train.

"It might give me a few laughs," I said after it passed. "And when these pictures are developed, I'll have something in my scrapbook to remember you by." I held up a yellow roll of film so he could get a good look. "My favorite is the one of you screwing the little fat man. I might even get an enlargement of that."

"You're bluffing."

"Am I?" I showed him my Leica. "I shot two rolls of thirty six. It's all in black-and-white, as they say."

"There's not enough light to take pictures down here."

"There is for Tri-X. Photography must not be one of your hobbies. I'll hang some of the juicier blowups on your office bulletin board. The newspapers might get a kick out of them, too. Not to mention the police." I turned to leave. "See you around. Why don't you try praying to the devil? Maybe he'll come and set you free."

Krusemark's disdainful smirk melted into a frown of deep concern. "Angel, wait. Let's talk this over."

"That's just what I had in mind, big shot. You talk, I'll do the listening."

Krusemark held out his free hand. "Give me the film. I'll tell you everything I know."

That made me laugh. "No deal. First you sing. If I like the tune, then you get the film."

Krusemark rubbed the bridge of his nose and stared at the dirty floor. "All right." His eyes flickered like yoyos as he watched me toss and catch the film. "I first met Johnny in the winter of '39. It was Candlemas eve. There was a celebration at the home of, well, her name doesn't matter; she's been dead ten years now. She owned a townhouse on Fifth near where they're building that ugly Frank Lloyd Wright museum. In the old days the place was famous for society balls; Mrs. Astor, the Four Hundred, that sort of thing. But the big ballroom was used only for Old Faith ceremonies and Sabbats when I knew it."

"Black Masses?"

"Sometimes. I never went to one there, but I had friends who did. Anyway, it was the night I met Johnny. I was impressed with him right at the start. He couldn't have been more than nineteen or twenty, but he had something special. You could feel the power running out of him like an electric current. His eyes were more alive than any I'd seen before in my life, and I've been around some.

"I introduced him to my daughter, and they hit it off right away. She was already more versed in the dark arts than me, and she recognized that special something in Johnny. His career was only getting started, and he was hungry for fame and wealth. Power was something he already had in spades. I watched him conjure up Lucifuge Rofocale, right in my own living room. That's a very complicated procedure."

"You expect me to swallow this?" I asked.

Krusemark leaned back against the ladder, resting one foot on the bottom rung. "Swallow it, spit it out; I don't give a damn. It's the truth. Johnny was in a lot deeper than I had the nerve to go. The things he did would have driven an ordinary man nuts. He always wanted more. He wanted it all. That's why he made a pact with Satan."

"What kind of pact?"

"The usual arrangement. He sold his soul for stardom."

"Crap!"

"It's true."

"It's bullshit, and you know it. What'd he do, sign a contract in blood?"

"I don't know the details." Krusemark's haughty glance was impatient and scornful. "Johnny was alone at midnight in Trinity Churchyard for the invocation. You shouldn't take what I say so lightly, Angel, not when playing with forces beyond your control."

"Okay, let's say I buy it: Johnny Favorite made a deal with the devil."

"Lord Satan Himself rose from the depths of Hell. It must have been magnificent."

"Sounds pretty risky, selling your soul. Eternity's a long time."

Krusemark smiled. On him it was more of a leer. "Pride," he said. "Johnny's sin was pride. He thought he could outwit the Prince of Darkness Himself."

"How?"

"You must understand I'm not a scholar, only a believer. I attended the ritual as a witness, but I can't tell you anything about the magic nature of the invocations or what went on during the week-long preparations preceding it."

"Get to the point."

Before he could get started, he was interrupted by a downtown express. I watched his eyes, and he met my gaze. Not an eyelid flicker betrayed him as he shuffled and reshuffled his story until the last car roared past.

"With Satan's help, Johnny made it big in a hurry. Real big. Overnight, he was a headliner; within a couple of years he was rich as Fort Knox. I guess it went to his head. He started thinking it was him that was the source of the power and not the Dark One. It wasn't long before he was boasting he found a way to duck out of his end of the bargain."

"Did he?"

"He tried. He had quite a library, and he came across an obscure rite in a manuscript by some Renaissance alchemist. It involved the transmutation of souls. Johnny had the idea that he could switch psychic-identities with someone else. Actually become the essence of the other person."

"Go on."

"Well, he had to have a victim. Someone his own age, born under the same sign. Johnny found a young soldier just back from North Africa. One of our first casualties. He had a brand-new medical discharge and was out celebrating New Year's Eve. Johnny picked him up in the crowd at Times Square. He drugged him in a bar and took him back to his place. That's where the ceremony took place."

"What kind of ceremony?"

"The transmutation rite. Meg assisted him. I was the witness. Johnny had an apartment at the Waldorf where he kept one room empty at all times for ceremonial use. The maids were told he practiced singing there.

"Dark velour curtains covered the windows. The soldier was bound naked on his back on a rubber mat. Johnny branded a pentacle on his chest. There was an incense brazier smoking in each corner, but the smell of burning flesh was much stronger.

"Meg unsheathed a virgin dagger, one never used before. Johnny blessed it in Hebrew and Greek. The prayers were new to me; I couldn't understand a word. When he finished, he bathed the blade in the altar flame and cut the soldier deeply across each tit. He dipped the dagger into the kid's blood and traced a circle with it on the floor around the body.

"There were more chants and incantations then. I didn't follow any of it. What I remember are the smells and the dancing shadows. Meg sprinkled handfuls of chemicals into the fire, and the flames changed color, green and blue, violet, pink. It was hypnotic."

"Sounds like the floorshow at the Copa. What happened to the soldier?"

"Johnny ate his heart. He cut it out so fast it was still beating when he wolfed it down. That was the end of the ceremony. Maybe he did gain possession of the guy's soul; he still looked like Johnny to me."

"What good did killing the soldier do him?"

"His plan was to drop out of sight when he had the chance and resurface as the soldier. He'd been stashing money in secret hiding places for some time. Lord Satan presumably would never know the difference. Trouble was, he didn't cover all the bases. He got shipped overseas before he could pull the switch and what came back couldn't remember its own name let alone a Hebrew incantation."

"And that's when your daughter entered the picture."

"Right. A year had gone by. Meg insisted we help him. I put up the cash to bribe the doctor, and we dropped Johnny off at Times Square on New Year's Eve. Meg made sure of that. It was the starring point, the last place the soldier remembered before Johnny drugged him."

"What happened to the body?"

"They dismembered it and fed the pieces to the hunting dogs in my kennel upstate."

"What else do you remember?"

"Nothing really. Maybe Johnny laughing after it was over. He joked about the victim. Said the poor bastard had no luck at all. They sent him overseas to the invasion at Oran and who ends up shooting at him: the fucking French! Johnny thought that was really funny."

"I was at Oran!" I grabbed Krusemark by his shirt and slammed him back against the ladder. "What was the soldier's name?"

"I don't know."

"You were there in the room."

"I didn't know anything about it until just before it happened. I was only the witness."

"Your daughter must have told you."

"No, she didn't. She didn't know herself. It was part of the magic. Only Johnny could know his victim's true name. Someone he trusted had to guard the secret for him. He sealed the soldier's dogtags in an ancient Egyptian Canopic urn and give it to Meg."

"What did this urn look like?" I was close to choking him. "Did you ever see it?"

"Many times. Meg kept it on her desk. It was alabaster, white alabaster, and had a three-headed snake carved on the lid."

FORTY-SIX.

I was in a hurry. Keeping the .38 tight against Krusemark's ribs, I unlocked the handcuffs and stuffed them in my jacket pocket. "Don't make a move," I said, backing toward the open entrance, my gun aimed at his midsection. "Don't even breathe."

Krusemark rubbed his wrist. "What about the film? You promised me the film."

"Sorry. I was lying about that. I pick up bad habits hanging around guys like you."

"I must have that film."

"Yeah, I know. A blackmailer's dream come true."

"If it's money you want, Angel ..."

"You can wipe your ass with your stinking money."

"Angel!"

"See you around, hotshot." I stepped out onto the pathway as an uptown local thundered by. I didn't care if the motorman saw me or not. My only mistake was shoving the Smith & Wesson back into my pocket. We all do dumb things sometimes.

I didn't hear Krusemark coming until he had me around the throat. I figured him all wrong. He was like a wild animal, dangerous and strong. Incredibly strong for a man his age. His breath came in short, angry snorts. He was the only one of us that was breathing.

Even with both hands I couldn't break his choke-hold. Shifting my weight, I got one of my feet hooked between his legs and pulled us off balance. We fell together against the side of the moving train, and the impact spun us apart like rag dolls, flinging me back against the subway wall.

Krusemark managed to stay on his feet. I wasn't so lucky. Sprawled like a drunk on the dusty path, I watched the iron wheels rush by, inches from my face. The train sped past. Krusemark aimed a kick at my head. I caught his foot and yanked him down. I'd been kicked enough for one week.

There wasn't time to grab the .38. Krusemark sat facing me on the path, and I sprang at him, driving my fist into the side of his neck. He made the sort of grunt you'd expect from a toad if you stepped on one. I hit him again, hard, and felt his nose collapse like rotten fruit. He grabbed my hair, yanking my head against his chest, and we grappled on the narrow pathway, gouging and kicking.

There was nothing fair about the fight. The Marquis of Queensberry would not have approved. Krusemark got me down and had his hard hands around my throat. When I couldn't part his weightlifter's grip, I pushed my right palm under his chin and levered his head back. It didn't work, so I jabbed my thumb into his eye.

That did the trick. I heard Krusemark scream even as a local train roared on down the tunnel. His grasp relaxed, and I twisted free, sucking in air. I parried his groping hands, and we wrestled, rolling together onto the tracks. I ended up on top and heard Krusemark's head thud against a wooden tie. I kneed him in the groin for good measure. There wasn't much fight left in the old man.

I stood up and felt my pocket for the Smith & Wesson. The gun was gone, lost in the struggle. A crunch of cinders alerted me as Krusemark's shadowy form staggered upright. He lurched and threw a wild roundhouse right Stepping inside, I pounded him twice in the midsection. He was hard and solid, but I knew I hurt him.

I took a left on the shoulder where it did no harm and poked my right fist into his face, connecting with the ridge of bone above his eye. It felt like hitting a stone wall. My hand went numb with pain.

That punch didn't slow Krusemark down at all. He lumbered on, throwing hard, skillful jabs as he came. I couldn't block them all, and he stung me a few times as I groped in my jacket for the handcuffs. I used the bracelets like a flail, backhanding him across the face. The crack of steel on bone was music to my ears. I hit him again, above the ear, and he went down backward with a grunt.

Krusemark's sudden scream echoed and died in the dripping tunnel like the sound of someone falling from a great height. A metallic, beetle-wing hum of electricity crackled in the darkness. The third rail.

I didn't want to touch the body. It was too dark to see him clearly, and I stepped back onto the safety of the path. In the light of a distant bulb, I could make out his obscure form, sprawled across the tracks.

I went back into the exit alcove and poked around inside the leather valise at the foot of the ladder. The papier-mache lion mask snarled up at me. Under the tangled black cape, I found a small plastic flashlight. That was all. I stepped out into the tunnel and switched it on. Krusemark lay crumpled like a pile of old clothing, his face frozen in his final agony. The sightless eyes stared down the tracks above an open mouth arrested in a soundless scream. A curling tendril of acrid smoke rose above his scorched flesh.