Card Sharks

The Ashes of Memory

6

"I know you. You're Hannah."

The quiet voice spoke in the dark. Hannah turned. In the dim glow of the lamps hung from the porch's ceiling, she could see Quasiman's eyes looking at her. "Hi. You came hack, huh?"

"Yeah. Sorry." He looked pained, frowning as if he had a migraine. "Hannah, it's so damned hard keeping it all together. Remembering you, remembering what we're doing and who's involved and why ... I write every day, and I keep looking at it when I forget, but ..."

"Don't apologize. I know you carft help it. Where were you?"

The hunchback shook his head. "I don't know. I heard a gunshot, and I was frightened. I saw you, but ... but ..." His shoulders sagged. His mouth twisted as his lips pressed together. "I've forgotten it. Already. The whole thing's gone now, and I don't know what it was or what it meant, but it was important. Damn it ..."

Quasiman went silent. He stepped out onto the rude wooden planks Where Hannah leaned against the railing, looking out to where Faneuil's grave lay invisible in the jungle night. Gently, as if he didn't want his nearness to trouble her, he halted several feet away. The gesture, so caring and self-effacing, touched her. She found herself smiling at the joker; he gave her a tentative smile in return. "Where's ... ?" Quasiman asked.

"Croyd? He got himself invited to dinner at Ngo's."

"You didn't want to go?"

Hannah shook her head. "No. I just felt like ... thinking."

"Are you still having nightmares about the bomb?"

"No. But it's nice of you to ask."

Quasiman took a step toward her. His hand lifted as if he were going to touch her as he had after the bomb in Saigon, then halted in mid-motion. "You sound sad," he said. "Didn't you find out anything this afternoon?"

Hannah gave a soft laugh at that. She moved her hand away from his. "I found out nothing, and also more than I bargained for. I'm just not sure What it means. You've sure set me on a strange course, you and your talk. The trouble is, it's starting to scare me, too." Hannah looked up at the sky - she didn't know if she'd ever seen so many stars. Yet like the prejudice and hatred she was uncovering, they too had always been there, hidden but unseen. "I think we've hit a dead end with Faneuil," she told him. "No records, no problems. Nothing. Dead men don't talk."

"But they can," Quasiman replied, softly and earnestly. He was looking at the sky also. "With the right person they can. I know how, Hannah...."

***

It seemed so easy in the old horror movies.

They took a pair of kerosene lanterns from behind the bar. In the back of Croyd's jeep they found a medical kit, a crowbar, and a shovel. Thus armed, Hannah and Quasiman went out into the field behind the village. Quasiman was a tireless, powerful worker, but he had his own limitations. Twice they had to stop: once when Quasiman found that he couldn't lift either arm because a major muscle group in his back had phased out, and again when his left leg disappeared. Both times, the episode was short, and Hannah only had to remind Quasiman of what they were doing a few times. Even so it was several hours before the shovel made a harsh tchunk! as it struck wood.

In that time, they'd piled up an impressive amount of earth, made a fair amount of noise, and acquired an audience of villagers. Hannah found it blackly amusing: a circle of Awed Asian faces watching a cliche in motion: the middle of the night, a hunchback digging up a grave in the light of a lantern held in the hand of a young woman. Croyd came up about the time Quasiman struck the casket, Ngo Dinh Yie in tow. Croyd stopped and let out a horse laugh. "Vell," he said, in an atrocious Germanic accent. "Haf you got ze brain for me, Igor?"

"As soon as you stop laughing at your own jokes, give us a hand with this," Hannah told him. "Bring that crowbar."

"Ja, Frau Frankenstein. Did anyone ever tell you you're lovely when you're macabre?" Croyd picked up the crowbar and walked over to look down into the hole, where Quasiman was standing on top of the rough wooden casket. "Mind if I ask what you're after? I mean, it's obvious enough what you intend to do, but why?" His tail brushed the length of her leg.

Hannah ignored it. "We need a ring."

"You could've asked me. There's a thousand jewelry stores back in Saigon. This is going about it the hard way."

Hannah glared at him. "All right," Croyd said at last. He hopped down into the open grave with Quasiman. Hannah came down after him with three handkerchiefs soaked in smelling salts. "Here," she said. "This is going to be bad."

It was. The smell of corruption hit them like a sledgehammer as soon as the lid was pried open. The handkerchiefs were little protection; Hannah, who at least had some small experience of decomposing bodies, gagged but managed to hold it down. Croyd struggled, then lost his supper to the side. Almost all the faces which had been looking down at them from above disappeared quickly. Quasiman alone seemed unaffected.

Hannah took a slow, deep breath into the handkerchief, men shone the light in. The face was unrecognizable, flesh rotting and peeling away from the bone. The wood had let in moisture: a green fuzz hung around the body's neck like a fur collar and mushrooms sprouted from his chest. The hands folded over the moldy suit were almost down to bone. In the lamplight, a ring glittered on the right hand: a class ring with a blue stone, inset with diamonds. "I'll do it, Hannah," Quasiman said.

"No," she told him. "I'll do it. Here, hold this." She gave the joker the lamp, then reached into the coffin with trembling fingers. She snatched at the ring, grimacing as the fingerbones broke apart from dried tendons. She slammed the lid down again and let out a breath she hadn't known she'd been holding. "That was gross," she said. "I sure as hell hope this was worth it." She shuddered "Let's get this done and over with - I have to take a bath."

She started to climb out of the grave. One face was still looking down at them, framed in stars: Ngo Dinh Yie. He was staring at the ring in Hannah's hand.

***

"Anything to declare?"

"A few articles of clothing," Hannah said. "Maybe a hundred dollars' worth. That's all."

The customs agent - his name tag said FIELDING - snapped shut her passport. He tapped it against his palm. Hannah's purse was still open before him, and Hannah tried to avoid looking at it - tried to pretend that it wasn't important. "Ms. Davis," Fielding said. "Would you please step out of line and follow me?"

"Wait a minute -" Hannah said. Her stomach was suddenly knotted; her breath tight. She could feel sweat beading at her hairline. Her fellow passengers were watching, and she oould feel the mixture of fascination and irritation coming from them.

"Please, ma'am. You're holding up the rest."

Fielding led her to a small office, opened the door, and ushered her in. Another customs official, seated behind a desk, nodded to them. Her passport and purse were given to the man, then the door was shut behind them. The agent perused the passport. "Ms. Hannah Davis?"

"And you're ... ?"

"Agent Stone. I need to ask you a few questions. You're returning from Free Vietnam?"

"Yes. Is there a problem? I had a personal invitation to visit the country from Ambassador Ngu, Prime Minister Meadows, and President Moonchild."

Stone smiled. "Yes, ma'am, we know. However, a Free Vietnam state official contacted us. They are investigating a report that a small group of Americans recently plundered an old grave in their country - among the stolen items was a ring. We also had a tip from another source that someone of your description would be smuggling it in. I wonder if you have a receipt for the ring that Agent Fielding found in your purse?"

Hannah tried to keep her expression noncommittal. "No, I don't. I didn't buy it. It was given to me several years ago. As you can see, I wasn't trying to hide the ring or smuggle it past. The ring wasn't stulled in the lining of my coat or inside my shoe heel, Agent Stone. It was lying in the bottom of my purse. The ring's mine."

Stone reached into the purse and pulled out the ring. He placed it on the table in front of Hannah. "Yours?" he said. "Odd. This looks like a man's ring. Would you mind putting it on?"

Hannah didn't move. Her stomach churned and she fought not to show it. She looked at Stone blandly. "I don't have to; it won't fit. The ring belonged to ... an old lover of mine. He died in an auto accident. I keep it for its sentimental value, not to wear. That's why it's in my purse."

"Aahh." Stone drummed his fingers on the table. "I'm afraid that I'll need to keep the ring for a few days, until we can verily with Saigon that this isn't the stolen item. We will, of course, give you a receipt ..."

"No!" Hannah protested. "You can't do that. That's not right."

Stone almost smiled. "I'm afraid that under the circumstances we both can and must, Ms. Davis. I can assure you that the ring will be returned to you just as soon as we hear from someone in Free Vietnam."

"Call Meadows, then. He'll tell you."

"We've done that. Unfortunately, he is unavailable at the moment." Stone smiled, and Hannah knew the man was lying. "I regret the inconvenience, but regulations ..."

"Are you detaining me as well - until you talk to Mark?"

"No, ma'am. At the moment, no formal charges have been filed. I'm sure you'll keep yourself available to us if we have further questions, but since Mr. Meadows knows you so well, I'm sure the whole matter will eventually be dropped. Still, I'm sure you understand why I have to do this."

"I understand," Hannah answered. "Actually, I think I understand very well." There didn't seem to be much else she could say. Stone was smiling politely at her. Hannah took a deep breath. "All right," she said. "I suppose I don't have a choice."

****

"I hate this," Hannah said. "I hate being suspicious of everyone I meet, and I hate even more the fact that it seems like the paranoia's justified. I hate being scared even worse, and that's what I feel all the time now. I'm frightened at what all this means."

"You want to quit, Hannah?" Quasiman asked.

Yes. "No," she said at last. "I guess not. I'm just ... well ..." Hannah frowned, then made a half-hearted attempt at a smile. "Where's the ring?"

Hannah hadn't thought the subtrefuge necessary, but suspicion seemed to be coming more easily now, and she'd worried about the way Ngo Dinh Yie had been staring at them, especially since Ngo's son had disappeared along with Durand. Once back in Saigon, she'd ask Croyd to find them a ring similar to Faneuil's. In the crowded warrens of that city, it had been easy enough.

Quasiman had teleported back to New York with Faneuil's ring, while Hannah carried the false one.

"Ring? What ring?" Quasiman said now. "Was I supposed to remember something about a ring?"

An invisible fist seemed to grab Hannah's lungs and squeeze. "Oh, no ..."

"It's a joke, Hannah," Quasiman said. He was smiling. "The ring's right here." Quasiman held out his hand. In the dim light of the nightclub, the blue stone and diamonds glittered.

"That wasn't funny. Not funny at all," she said, but she smiled back at him. Hannah breathed a sigh of relief. She was still exhausted from the flight in and the confrontation at Customs.

Hannah had thought herself half-crazy for being that devious. She told herself it was only a little test, to prove to herself that she was being ridiculous. She'd told herself that she was going to feel absolutely silly when she got back to New York and nothing had happened. Now she wondered whether she'd been cautious enough.

She wished that this mysterious ace they were waiting for would hurry. Being in Jokertown was bad enough, but the Club Dead Nicholas wasn't exactly a place to inspire confidence. The Dead Nicholas had once been a crematorium. Hannah and Quasiman were seated at the table near the old furnaces, the walls of which had been taken out and turned into a large open grill, where a trio of demonic-looking jokers were grilling steaks and flipping burgers. Altogether too cute mechanical bats flapped and squealed through the dark recesses of the ceiling. Hannah's table was a glass-covered coffin, in which the corpse of a blue-skinned joker resided. Their waiter, a pale wraith wrapped in a gauzy shroud, had assured her that all the corpses were waxworks; Hannah hoped he was right. The blackened chicken she'd ordered had been tasty enough, but she'd only picked at it, her appetite gone.

Hannah suspected she was the only nat in the place. She felt out of place and a little threatened despite the mask she wore - a foam rubber feline half-mask. Masks, in and out of fashion in Jokertown since the 50s, had once again become chic in the wake of the Rox invasion. Hannah didn't care for them. The faces twisted by the wild card were bad enough, but masks hid entirely too much. There was too much hidden about Jokertown already for her taste.

"Your ... friend is ready for you." The waiter had drifted up to their table - literally. Hannah noticed that he had no feet underneath the ragged shroud. "If you'll follow me ..."

Hannah and Quasiman followed the joker to the rear of the club and down a short corridor. He knocked on a door and nodded to them. "Go on in," he said.

Someone opened the door. Hannah could see a room decorated in red satin wallpaper, dimly lit by a few lamps. The corner of a low table was just visible in front of a worn sofa. Quasiman went in first. The woman who'd opened the door greeted the joker, then looked at Hannah inquisitively. Hannah took off her mask and nodded to the woman.

"Cameo," Quasiman said. "This is Hannah. We're ..." He stopped and looked distressed. "I've forgotten why we came," he said, looking from Cameo to Hannah.

"It's okay," Cameo told him. "Father Squid told me most of it." Hannah could see how the woman came by her name: the cameo profile of woman, white on black, hung from a black ribbon around her throat. She had a man's fedora hat in her hands; it looked too large for her: worn, stained and dirty. "Hi," she said to Hannah.

Her voice was soft and, like Quasiman's, somewhat shy, but there was hardness underneath. An angry sadness himg about her like a psychic cloak, and her large, dark eyes looked as if they had seen too much. This was a woman who would follow her own agenda, Hannah decided. She wasn't sure she was going to trust this Cameo. "Father told me about what's happened," Cameo continued. "He said you think there's a group of people out to hurt the jokers. The fire ... it was a horrible thing. I think nearly everyone in Jokertown lost someone close to them that night. I ... well, I'll do what I can." She sat on a small couch next to the table, and gestured for Hannah and Quasiman to take two chairs on the opposite side.

"You really can do this?" Hannah asked. "You can talk with a dead man through his ring? I can ask you the questions I need to know?"

Cameo shook her head. "You ask him yourself. I become him."

"I'm looking for anything Faneuil knows about a man called Pan Rudo." Hannah stopped, her eyes narrowing. Cameo's mouth had opened slightly, as if she were about to speak, and she twisted the fedora in her hands as if it were a washcloth. Then the woman recovered, and an inner veil seemed to draw across her eyes. "You'll really be Faneuil?" Hannah finished.

"For as long as I'm wearing the ring. If he were an ace, I'd have his powers. That's why ..." Cameo stopped, swallowing hard, and Hannah could see the pain again, closer to the surface. "That's why Battle thought I'd be so useful on the Rox."

"George c. Battle?"

"Yeah. That's him."

The same people, all the time.... The fear that had haunted her in Vietnam returned to Hannah. "You were there working for him? You fought against the jokers?"

"I've been lots of people." Cameo said. The fedora slapped her thigh angrily. "Every last one of them had done something at some time that they weren't proud of. I guess this was my turn. Battle used me and lied to me, but I was still stupid enough to go along with him in the first place. It'll be a long time before I forgive myself."

"That's what someone who was still working for them might say."

"It might be." Cameo spat out the words, staring at Hannah. The woman held out her hand. "So where's this ring?" she asked.

Hannah was no longer sure if she wanted to go through with this. But before she could move or speak, Quasiman handed Cameo the ring. Cameo placed the ring on her finger and fisted her hand around it. She threw the fedora on the coffee table, sat heavily on the couch and closed her eyes, leaning back. Hannah waited, not quite knowing what to expect. Would this Cameo change her appearance? Would, she speak in Faneuil's voice like she was possessed? Quasiman and Father Squid had both been vague on the details of this summoning. Hannah shifted in her seat, uneasy.

Cameo's eyes opened. She uncurled her hand.

"Faneuil's not dead," she said.

Quasiman snorted. Hannah felt like she'd been kicked in the stomach. "You're sure?"

Cameo nodded. "There's a lot of personal energy in this ring. I can feel it. When you wear something all day, every day; when you use something so much that it becomes part of you - then some of your energy gets locked up in the item. That's not so unusual a belief either; that's why a lot of so-called 'primitive' cultures are careful about how they dispose of hair clippings and even excrement: what was once part of you is always part of you. When a person dies, I can use the emotional matrix embedded in a physical object to bring them up. I think ... I've kind of imagined that the ego barriers are gone then. But while they're still alive, the person is too strong, too connected to their body. I can't do anything with the energy, even though I can sense it. This is the same - whoever wore this ring is still alive, somewhere."

Hannah looked at Quasiman. The hunchback was looking at her, waiting, with a trusting gaze. "You knew that, didn't you, Hannah?" he said. "You weren't convinced he was dead."

"I wondered, yes. But ..." Hannah frowned, looking at Cameo. "Pardon me, but how do we know you're telling the truth?"

"Why should I lie?"

Because you worked for Battle. Because even though my instincts tell me that you're genuinely sorry, I don't trust anyone anymore and my stomach's killing me and I can't sleep nights. Hannah didn't say it, she only stared. That was a standard procedure in interviewing: wait. Most people hate silence. Sometimes they filled it with things they might otherwise not have said. Cameo either knew that or was an exceptionally patient person. She returned Hannah's gaze openly, keeping the eye contact far longer than Hannah expected. Finally Hannah sighed and stood up.

"Thank you, Cameo," she said. "You've given us a lot to think about."

"You don't like me, do you?"

"I don't know you." Hannah held the woman's gaze without blinking. "But I don't trust you."

"I don't trust anybody, either. Except the dead." Cameo picked up the hat again, placing it on her lap.

"I prefer people when they're living. Come on, Quasi." Hannah started toward the door. Quasiman stared at Cameo for a long minute, as if he were seeing something in her face invisible to Hannah.

"He Wanted to help," he said to her, and then limped after Hannah. Cameo reacted as if she'd been hit in the stomach. Her face went as white as the cameo at her throat. Hannah reached the door and opened it.

"Pan Rudo," Cameo said behind them.

The name was like an incantation. Hannah shivered, as if someone had just brushed her spine with a finger. She turned.

Cameo's fingers crumpled the fedora's rim. "Pan Rudo. Card Sharks. They're what you're looking for, right?"

Card Sharks; the words sent an icy finger down Hannah's spine. "Yes," she managed.

"You going to see Rudo again? You going to tell him about what you know?" When Hannah didn't answer, Cameo smiled grimly. "Hey, it's a fair question. You asked me about Battle. And I don't care if you have Quasiman and Father Squid fooled, you're still a goddamn nat."

Hannah nodded. She knew that without Croyd's tale, she would have gone back to him. She would have told Rudo everything. But not now. Croyd hadn't seemed to be the most stable of personalities, but his reaction to Rudo's name had been genuine, and there'd been no reason for him to lie.

Just as there was no reason for Cameo to lie about Faneuil. "All right," Hannah answered. "No. That's your answer. Rudo may be the one responsible for the fire. So ... do you know him?"

"Not me. A ... friend. I brought the hat along because of that, because of what Father told me when he called. Kept me up all night, and I spent today trying to decide whether I was going to come here or not. Trying to decide whether I'd tell you or not. I'd even made up my mind that I wasn't going to ..." Her eyes were bleak, and Hannah had a sense of the frailness and vulnerability that lay under the woman's surface. "One of the side effects of my ... gift" - she said the word like it was a curse - "is that I experience vicarously everything the person I summon has experienced. I get to know my people very well. Too well, sometimes." She picked up the fedora and placed it on her lap. "This is Nicky's hat," she said. "He knew Rudo. And he ... he ..."

Tears had gathered in the young woman's eyes. Hannah waited. On the couch, Cameo took a deep breath. "I'll let him tell you," she said.

Cameo put the hat on her head.