The 5th Witch (20 page)

“You mean…?” said Ernie. He held out his hand with his index finger drooping.

Annie nodded. “It’s the best revenge that any woman can take on a man, don’t you think?”

“I’ll take her feet,” said Ernie. “What? I’m a married man! I get impotent, Rosa will kill me!”

Dan and Ernie climbed the staircase, their sodden shoes squelching. When they reached the gallery, they found the witch lying on her back, coughing up strings of pale yellow phlegm and rocking from side to side. Although she wasn’t tied up with cord, her wrists and her knees and her ankles were pressed tightly together, and it was clear that she was unable to pry them apart.

“
I shall make the piss in your bladders boil!
” she spluttered. “
I shall pull out your guts and fry them in front
of you!
”

“You want to tell me your name?” Dan asked her.

“
You will have to guess that, you smear of hog’s excrement
.”

“Wouldn’t be Greensmith, by any chance?”

The witch went into another coughing fit and rocked so violently that they could hear her spine making a knobbly sound against the floorboards.

“Well, whoever you are, I’m arresting you on suspicion of conspiracy to commit multiple homicide, as well as all those other crimes and misdemeanors I told you about. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.”

“
You are not fit to lick the devil’s poop-
hole
.”

Ernie raised his eyebrows. “Hey,
abuela
—I’ll remember that. That should go down well at your arraignment.”

Dan leaned over and forced his hands into the tattered folds of the witch’s cloak, trying not to get snagged on the hooks and the dried herbs that were fastened all over it. The witch had an indescribable smell, stale urine and lavender, but something else, too, something caustic, like oven cleaner, that burned his sinuses.

“You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided for you. Do you understand what I’ve just said to you?”

“
You think that I will stand in front of your court? Nobody
can judge me except my lord and master
.”

Dan dug his hands deep into her bony armpits, while Ernie took hold of her ankles. “Ready?” asked Dan. “Then,
hup
.”

Although she was such a skeletal old woman, the witch was surprisingly heavy. They had to carry her very slowly down the stairs, and at one point Ernie almost lost his footing and had to make a grab for the banisters to steady himself. Eventually, however, they
managed to shuffle across the hallway and out of the front doors. She squeezed her eyes tightly against the sunshine, and her lips puckered.

They carried her over to the Torrent, opened the hatchback, and lowered her inside.

“
You bubbles of dog snot
,” she sneered at them.

“Look who’s talking,” Ernie retorted. “You really need to blow your nose, you know?”

“How long is she going to stay helpless like this?” Dan asked Annie. “Like, do you think I should put the cuffs on her, just in case?”

“She can’t get free. Not until I break the spell for her.”

“What was that, all that
buzz-
de-
yad
stuff you were reading out? Was that Enochian?”

She nodded. “The language of the angels. That particular incantation neutralizes hexes and makes it impossible for witches to cast any spell that might do anybody harm.”

“And that light?”

“What are you asking me?”

“I’m not too sure. I thought I saw some kind of face in it, that’s all.”

“Like you said before, you’re a little keyed up.”

Dan cocked his head to one side. “Annie?”

“I’m not telling you, Dan. Either you believe, or you don’t.”

Ernie went back to the porch and closed the front doors, wedging an old wrought-iron chair under the handles to keep them together. Then they all climbed into the Torrent, and drove back down the driveway. Dan kept glancing toward the woods, but he didn’t see the pale fawn figure with the pointed head and horns.

As they turned onto Stone Canyon Road, they heard the witch kicking and moaning in the back. “
I
curse you forever! You are no better than cat’s vomit! I curse
you from the scurf in your scalp to the bunions on your
stinking feet!
”

Ernie thumped on the hatchback cover and shouted, “Shut up,
bruja!
I’ve had enough of you for one day!”

Dan said, “Those other three witches are going to be pretty pissed, don’t you think, when they find out that all of their extra power has been taken away.”

“Well, yes.” Annie smiled. “They won’t be very happy. But you don’t want to underestimate them, even now.”

“They won’t be able to do what they did to those SWAT teams, will they?”

“No. I don’t think so. It takes such an enormous amount of magical power to raise the Night Wind, and those
kukurpas
that follow them. And once you’ve raised them, you have to be able to control them and send them back to where they belong. Otherwise they won’t hesitate to tear
you
apart, too. They’re not very big on gratitude, creatures like that.”

“How about blowing people up in midair and setting fire to them and making them cough up toads? Can they still cast spells like that?”

“I don’t know for sure. Probably. But they won’t be able to cast them at any great distance—not like they’ve been doing up until now. Like I say, they’re all very skillful witches, and we still need to be careful. But now that we’ve cut them off from
this
witch’s magical energy, they’re going to be much easier to trap.”

They drove slowly along Hollywood Boulevard and turned into the parking lot at the back of police headquarters. It was crowded already in anticipation of this evening’s operation at West Grove Country Club. Four black SWAT vans, eight squad cars, three unmarked Crown Victorias, and more than fifty officers talking and drinking coffee and checking their equipment.

Dan climbed out of the Torrent and saluted four or five of the officers he knew. Then he turned to Ernie and said, “See all these guys here? They don’t know it, but I think we’ve already saved their lives.”

Ernie climbed the steps into the station and came back out a few minutes later with two female police officers, one big and blond with hefty hips, the other black and skinny with prominent teeth. When Dan opened the Torrent’s hatchback and they saw the rancid, ragged creature hunched inside, the blond officer said, “Oh my
God
,” and the black officer flapped her hand in front of her face in disgust.

For her part, the witch blinked furiously into the sunlight, grinding her teeth.

“Come on, sweetheart,” said Dan. “Let’s get you out of there.”

The witch spat and spat again, until she had long strings of saliva trembling from her lips. “
I curse you
all! I curse you all forever! May your skin bubble with pustulent
buboes and your tongues turn into the slimiest of
slugs!
”

“Where did you find
this
charmer?” asked the blond officer.

Dan took hold of the witch’s ankles. “I know she looks like a street person, but she’s anything but. So treat her with caution, okay? Ernie, want to give me a hand lifting her out?”

“Hey—” Ernie reminded him. “I’m at the feet end, remember?”

The two female officers kept well back as Dan and Ernie lifted the witch out of the Torrent. The witch kept jerking and twisting and swinging herself from side to side, but they managed to carry her up the steps and through the front doors.

“Can’t she walk?” asked the blond officer. “It’s not like she’s restrained or nothing.”

“Oh, she’s restrained all right. And lucky for us that she is.”

As they passed the front desk, Sergeant Mullins said, “What you got there, Detectives? Last week’s dirty laundry?”

“Female prisoner, name unknown. Just book her for us, will you? Conspiracy to commit homicide, plus about two dozen other offenses. I’ll give you the full list later.”

“
You will suffer, just like these poor fools!
” the witch whispered at Sergeant Mullins. “
Your fingers and toes
will drop off and woodlice will crawl out of your anus!
”

Sergeant Mullins raised one eyebrow. “It’s been a pleasure to meet you, too, ma’am.”

Every step was a struggle, but Dan and Ernie managed to carry the witch down two flights of stairs and all the way along the gray-painted corridor to the cells. She spat and cursed and swore at them without pausing for breath, and if she had still been able to invoke her magical power, they all would have been struck down on the spot with strokes or heart attacks and a whole variety of debilitating diseases from leukemia to leprosy.

When they reached the end of the corridor, they carried her into the last cell and dropped her unceremoniously onto the bunk.

“Detective Munoz and me, we have to talk to the
lieutenant,” Dan told the two female officers. “Meanwhile, we need you to strip this lady and search her. It’s going to be a little awkward because she can’t pry her wrists or her knees apart, but I’m sure you’ll manage. Whatever she says to you—and I mean
whatever
she says to you—ignore it.”

“Ignore it?” said the black officer tartly. “I wish. I never heard
nobody
with such a dirty mouth, ’specially an old lady like this.”

Dan laid his hand on Annie’s shoulder. “Ms. Conjure here will give you any assistance you need.”

“Is she from welfare?” asked the blond officer.

“Let’s just say that she’s an expert in cases like these. Or as much of an expert as anybody possibly could be.”

To Annie, he said, “Is she going to be safe here? She won’t be able to work any you-know-what, will she?” He spun his finger around like a magic wand.

“No,” said Annie. “But when these officers have finished changing her clothes, I’ll put a seal on the cell door, just to make absolutely sure.”

“I really appreciate what you did there, back at the house. You were amazing.”

“Thanks—although it wasn’t really me. I mean, I read the incantation, but the magical power that made it work…that came from someone much more amazing than me.”

There was a challenging gleam in her eyes, as if she were daring him to ask her who it was. God? An angel? Or some other supernatural power that he had never heard of?

He looked away, then looked back again. “You did the business, that’s all I care about. Listen—when you’re done here, come upstairs. The desk sergeant will show you where we are.”

“We got her,” Dan announced. “The fourth witch—she’s in custody downstairs.”

Lieutenant Harris was standing at his desk, frowning at a large-scale map of West Grove Country Club. He took off his glasses and said, “You’re kidding me. You found her?”

“She was hiding out in Ben Burrows’s old house, up on Stone Canyon Road.”

“How the hell did you find her there?”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you, so I won’t.”

“Did she give you any trouble?”

“Let’s put it this way—it wasn’t exactly a walk in the park, but my friend Annie helped us out. The witch has been restrained now with a magical incantation.”

“A magical incantation?”

“Annie did it. She’s very good at magical incantations.”

“Really?”

“Really. And herbal medicine. And spells. She can tell your fortune, and she can cure your back pain, and she can tell you if you’re going to find the woman of your dreams. Anyhow, this magical incantation prevents the witch from casting any spells. And most important of all, it prevents her from sharing her power with those other three witches.”

Lieutenant Harris pushed his fingers through his prickly gray hair. “I’m not sure what to say to you,” he admitted. “You know I don’t believe in any of this black magic malarkey. But…I have to admit to feeling kind of relieved.”

“Sir, it doesn’t matter if you believe in it or not. What matters is that when we go to pick up the Zombie and the White Ghost and Vasili Krylov this evening, we won’t have to face the same godawful creatures that massacred those two SWAT teams.
The witches simply won’t have enough power to call them up.”

“You realize I won’t be able to give you any kind of commendation for this? I can’t even mention it in my report. Not without looking like a fruit loop, anyhow.”

“That doesn’t matter either,” said Dan. “The most important thing is that no more officers end up getting ripped to pieces.”

Annie came into Lieutenant Harris’s office, and Dan introduced her.

“I gather we have something to thank you for,” said Lieutenant Harris.

“I didn’t really have a choice,” Annie told him. “I don’t know of anybody else who could have captured a witch as powerful as this one. Besides, if any witch is using her craft to do evil, I
have
to try and stop her.”

“You
have
to?”

“I guess you could say it’s my destiny. It’s what my mother taught me to do and what my grandmother taught
her
to do. Magic is only supposed to be used for good. You know—to heal people when they’re sick. To bring people love and luck and happiness. To make things grow. Magic is the greatest gift that any woman can possess.”

“Well, I can understand the destiny thing,” said Lieutenant Harris. “My dad was a cop and my grandfather was a cop and my great-grandfather was a U.S. marshal. I have to tell you, though, I’m still pretty skeptical about magic.”

“I know you are,” said Annie. “I can feel it.”

“You can
feel
it?”

Annie held out both hands toward him. “Skepticism feels like thistles. Just like belief feels like polished marble, and love feels like deep, warm water.”

Lieutenant Harris looked over Annie’s shoulder at Dan and pulled a face.

“What can I tell you, Lieutenant?” said Dan. “Even if you don’t believe in witches, you have to admit that Annie’s a damn good one.”

Annie said, “When you go down to the witch’s cell, Lieutenant, you’ll see that there’s a wax medallion stuck to the door with red ribbons hanging from it. It’s a sigil…a magical seal to prevent the witch from sending any of her power out of the building to the other witches. It has some markings on it that look like forks and squiggles and triangles. Those are the signs of an angel called Cassiel, the ruler of the seventh heaven.

“Whatever you do, don’t take it off. I’ve already told those two women officers not to remove it, and they’re going to tell the desk sergeant, too.”

Lieutenant Harris held up both of his hands. “If you say to leave it on the door, young lady, that’s where it’s going to stay. I promise you.”

It was still only 3:25
P.M
., so the three of them drove to Ernie’s apartment building on Lincoln Boulevard to freshen up and have a late lunch. Dan hadn’t felt like eating breakfast that morning, but now he was ravenous.

“You’re quiet all of a sudden,” he told Annie.

“I’m feeling a little strange, that’s all.”

“Strange in what way? Maybe you’re just tired after all that incanting.”

“No, I don’t feel tired at all. In fact I feel really energized. Like I’ve drunk ten cups of espresso.”

“It’s that high you get after an arrest. Your system’s still full of adrenaline. That’s why some cops beat up on the people they’ve just busted. I usually tell them to go to the gym and work it all off on the rowing machine.”

Ernie said, “Me, I like to eat. I book somebody, I head for the Casa Blanca Café and order the
huevos
rancheros
and the pork
gorditas
and the chicken-and-cheese burrito. You can’t feel aggressive with nobody after that.”

“Aggressive? I’m surprised you can even walk.”

They parked outside a 1960s apartment block with pale blue walls and red-painted window frames. Ernie led them to a concrete-paved courtyard into which the sun never shone. Two young boys were listlessly playing on a swingset. Ernie ruffled their hair and said, “Carlo, Sancho, say hello to your Uncle Dan. And say hello to Ms. Conjure here.”

“These your boys?” asked Annie.

Ernie nodded proudly. “Carlo is nine in September, and Sancho’s seven next March.”

Annie took Carlo’s hand between hers. “Carlo, that’s a good name. Especially for an auto mechanic. You
do
want to be an auto mechanic, don’t you?”

Ernie shook his head in admiration. “How did you know that? He’s always been totally crazy about cars. He used to make car noises when he was sitting in his stroller.”

Annie took Sancho’s hand next. “And you, Sancho, you’re going to grow up to be a musician. You’re going to play the guitar and sing your own songs, and you’ll be very famous. One day you’re going to be singing a song about a white bird that comes to your window, and you’ll remember this day, and me telling you about it.”

Sancho shyly retrieved his hand and said nothing.

“They’re terrific boys,” Annie told Ernie. “They’re going to make you proud.”

“Uncle Dan,” said Carlo, “can you do that thing with the quarter for us?”

“Hey, don’t bother your Uncle Dan,” Ernie scolded.

But Dan went up to him and reached down into the back of his T-shirt, so that Carlo giggled and squirmed. “Sorry, Carlo…there’s no quarters down there today. But—wait a minute! What’s this? It feels like a flower!” And he produced a dollar bill, folded into the shape of a rose.

“Me too!” said Sancho, excitedly. “Me too!”

“Kids love magic, don’t they?” said Annie, as they squeezed themselves into the elevator.

Ernie pushed the button for 4. “What you said about the boys, that’s really going to happen?”

Annie nodded.

Dan said, “The last time you told my fortune, you had to use tarot cards and tea leaves.”

“I know. I don’t really know how I did that without the tarot, but it seemed so clear. Maybe I’m just getting more sensitive.”

They reached the fourth floor and walked along the red linoleum corridor. Ernie opened the door of his apartment and said, “Welcome to my home.” Inside, there was a pungent smell of garlic and onions, and a woman was singing along to a Frank Corrales record on the radio, “Una Mañana de Abril.”

“Rosa!” called Ernie. “Rosa, we have visitors!”

He led them through to a small living room furnished with two big couches and two big armchairs, all upholstered in rose-patterned fabric with lace antimacassars. On the walls hung oil paintings of Mexican dancers and framed photographs of Carlo and Sancho, as well as a red glass shrine to the Virgin Mary with holy water in it.

Ernie’s wife came out of the kitchen wiping her hands. She was a plump, pretty young woman with curly black hair tied up with a bright red scarf, and bright red lips.

“Dan, how are you?” she said, kissing him on both
cheeks, and then once more. “Such a long time since I see you!”

“This is Annie,” said Ernie. “Annie has been working with us. She has a very special gift.”

Rosa shook Annie’s hand. “Pleasure to meet you. Would you care for a drink? Are you hungry?”

“Hungry?” Dan told her. “I could eat a horse. In fact I could eat a whole team of horses.”

“Horses I don’t have—but I just baked some empanadas.”

“Empanadas…mmm!” said Dan, in imitation of Homer Simpson. “Annie, you don’t know what Mexican food is until you’ve eaten Rosa’s empanadas. Flaky pastry filled with ground beef and chillies.”

They went out onto the balcony and sat together at a glass-topped table. Rosa brought out a large jug of lemonade and a plate of empanadas and
garnachas
, little cups of tortilla dough filled with black beans and lemon-marinated slices of onion. Dan would have killed for a cold Corona, but they would be going back on duty in less than three hours.

“So what is your special gift?” Rosa asked Annie.

“She can tell fortunes,” said Ernie. “She said that Carlo would be an auto mechanic and that Sancho would be a famous musician.”

“Maybe you should tell Ernie’s fortune,” said Rosa. “He has been trying for promotion for so long.”

Ernie emphatically shook his head. “No…never. I don’t want to see what the future has in store for me. I want every day to be a surprise. Besides, you might tell me something that I don’t want to hear.”

Rosa said, “You’re such a chicken. Annie, why don’t you tell my fortune? Then I will know if I am going to be married to a captain of detectives one day.”