Constantine Read Free

highway and into the labyrinthine warrens of plaster and baked clay and brick, past startled faces, deeper into the ghetto of the poor.
    Not everyone here is poor, Francisco. There is money. A man who loans money, there up ahead, with only one handgun to protect him. Kill him and take his money and his clothes. You must go north. You will find a way across the desert. ..
    The voice seemed to come from all around him and from within him at once. But as he stopped for a moment to catch his breath, he felt that someone else was there too. He looked around.
    No one was there. Watching.
    Francisco felt that “no one” distinctly. Invisible, but somehow Francisco felt him there.
    It does not matter, Francisco. Go north. Trust me.
    Trust the spike of iron . .. It protected you from the car and the police . .. Anything is possible!
    So Francisco started his journey north… to Los Angeles.

TWO
    Los Angeles, California

    L ittle Consuela had a cold, that was all. Her mother, Dierdre, pouring hot water into the mug containing the powdered flu medicine, was quite sure it was just a cold, had convinced herself that it was just a mild delirium from fever that had made the child say those horrible things; had made her throw that lamp.
    Dierdre would give her the children’s aspirin, some TheraFlu, and take her to the doctor. Hard to get her an appointment at this hour of the morning, but the pediatrician had finally agreed on ten A.M. Consuela would be fine.
    “Mama… MAMMMMAAAA…” A frightened wail. Well, she was only seven. The delirium would naturally frighten her. Still - there was something in her voice that wrenched Dierdre’s heart.
    “I’m coming, baby. I’ve got your medicine…” She really should be at work, but there was no taking a child this sick to kindergarten. This was yet another time that asshole Fred could’ve been of use.
    Maybe I should’ve given Fred another chance, she thought, carrying the tray down the hall of the two bedroom West Hollywood apartment. Maybe he’ll grow up eventually and stop trying to boss everything in-
    The thought simply snapped off by shock as she stepped into her daughter’s room.
    Her little girl, Consuela, was clinging to the wall near the ceiling, defying gravity, insectile and inhuman, angled so her head was aimed toward the floor. Her face was whipping back and forth, in shadow, so fast her features couldn’t be made out.
    And the sound from her throat - the sound of a thousand souls merged in torment-
    Distantly Dierdre heard the tray crash on the floor, the mug shattering. Then all sounds were swallowed up by her screaming.
    --
    A dirty Los Angeles sunset. Sun blazing all sickly as it sank into a band of smog. As the taxi pulled up in front of the apartment building, Constantine gazed at the sullen colors of the sunset between the silhouettes of palm trees on the western horizon.
    All that color in the smog, Constantine thought. Funny how poison can be so pretty. Reminds me of a girl I knew when I was in the band. Now what was her name…
    Constantine - a lean man in a long, shabby black coat, stub of a cigarette between nicotine- yellowed fingers - got out and signaled Chaz to wait. Chaz was getting out, too: A young man in casual LRG hip-hop regalia, with a very non-hip-hop artifact in his hands: a book about Martinist symbology, written in French. Getting the signal to wait from Constantine, Chaz sighed, and nodded, leaning against the car.
    One of these days, Constantine thought, going into the building, I’m going to take Chaz in with me. What’s the use of an apprentice if he doesn’t back you up? But I’ll probably regret it.
    He tried to draw on the cigarette, saw it had gone out, dropped it into the gutter, ground it out with his boot. He went into the apartment building, patting his coat pocket for another cigarette.
    He lit a Lucky Strike with his ornate lighter figured with spiritual symbology.
    Father Hennessy was waiting in the foyer. A stocky,