Deuces Down

WITH A FLOURISH AND A FLAIR by Kevin Andrew Murphy

Pleasant evening, artist. A present. And a responsibility.” Sam looked up from his sketchbook just in time to see miniature squid attempting to escape from pirouline cookies, the pastry flutes impaled in a goblet filled with guacamole mixed with pomegranate seeds, winking like demonic eyes behind the round facets. While on one level he knew it was meant to be an exotic appetizer, fusion cuisine of the East-meets-West-goes-South-then-hits-the-other-side-of-the-galaxy school, the end result looked like nothing half so much as a sundae for the Elder Gods.

Hastet benasari Julali Ackroyd, earth’s first and currently only Takisian chef, set the eldritch offering on the table in Martha Stewart’s “It’s a good thing” presentation position.

Sam knew enough to smile, trying to avoid the wide-eyed “Help me!” stares and frantic tentacles of the squidlets which were, he noted out of the corner of one eye, frozen into position with strands of carmelized sugar.

“And the responsibility?”

“Inclusion in tomorrow’s brunch menu?” She preened, smoothing down her apron. “Since you’re already redoing it, I thought this might be Starfields’ new feature item.”

It looked more like a feature from the Bowery Wild Card Dime Museum. A diorama of the Swarm Invasion perhaps, or one of the more disturbing examples of the Monstrous Joker Babies. But Sam knew it would not be politic to say so. Not if he wanted to keep his job. “Um… could we do it as table placards?”

“As you like,” said Hastet. “I just showed my husband, and he said it would be perfect for Halloween.” She beamed at the mass of tentacles, then frowned. “But that’s not till Wednesday, isn’t it?”

Sam gestured to the patrons in costume about the restaurant. “People celebrate early.”

“Oh good.” She pursed her lips then. “I haven’t given it a name yet. I was thinking ‘Takisian Surprise,’ but given the last one, I don’t think that would sell.” Absently, she tucked a stray brown curl under her chef’s pepperbox. “Jay also said something about ‘Lovecraft’ when he saw it. But that would be for Valentine’s Day, wouldn’t it?”

Sam pictured Cthulhu got up as Cupid and was immediately sorry he had. “No, not exactly.”

Hastet rolled her eyes. “You earthlings have too many holidays.” She gave a grandiloquent wave of dismissal to the tentacle parfait, which Sam guessed to be the Takisian equivalent of ‘Whatever.’ “I trust your judgment. Just let it speak to you.” With that, she slipped back through the arch to the kitchen, leaving Sam alone with the otherworldly hors d’oeuvre.

He leaned closer and gave it a wary glance, half expecting it to go scuttling across the table.

It was looking back. A nameless thing from the far depths of space. Bloodstone eyes watched below, flat lavender ovals stared above. Lidless. Unblinking. Alien. Sam wondered how it could possibly speak to him, afraid that it would.

Then it did: “Nice hat you have there.”

A lifetime of living in Jokertown had taught Sam that the most unlikely things could speak. Plants. Animals. Even the urinal in Squisher’s Basement. Things that had once been people, and horribly, on some level, still were, the wild card twisting their bodies into forms no longer even remotely human. But only rarely did they become entities as bizarre as Hastet’s new appetizer. “What?”

“I said ‘Nice hat,’” the dish of tentacles and avocado ichor repeated, its voice incongruously dulcet and feminine, albeit slightly annoyed. “Had it long?” Sam then realized that none of the squid were moving their lips, and unless the eldritch sundae were telepathic-always an option when dealing with victims of an alien virus-it was more likely that the speaker was someone behind it.

He sat up straight and looked past the sugar-frosted cephalopods.

The voice belonged to a woman. A nat woman to all appearances, mid-thirties but damn fine for all that, as petite or even more so than Hastet, with one of those figures you usually need corsetry to get, displaying it to best advantage in a tux shirt, black tie, swallowtail coat, black satin short-shorts, and cobweb-patterned black fishnets over stiletto heels. This ensemble was topped off with a top hat, worn over masses of Titian curls somewhere between Dr. Tachyon and the naturally vain girl from Peanuts. Accented with devil red lipstick and nails, the whole look said either stage magician or hooker, or something with the same effect thrown together for a semi-elegant semi-trashy evening of clubbing the Saturday before Halloween.

Sam heartily approved of the outfit, and the woman in it, and not just because his was almost the same, except he had the cobweb lace as cravat and cuffs, jeans instead of short-shorts, Does in place of stilettos, and slightly more gothic taste in nailpolish. And black velvet gloves, at least on his left hand. He tapped it to the brim of his own top hat. “No, just picked it up.” Sam felt a grin steal across his face as he took in the sights, since up close she looked even better than when he’d first noticed her an hour ago. “Nice threads yourself. Columbia, or Sally from Cabaret?”

She paused for a moment. “No, Topper.”

“She was one of the SCARE aces, right?” Now that she mentioned the name, Sam could see the likeness. “’Cause if you’re supposed to be the guy from the old ghost movies, I never would have gotten it. But speaking of spirits, can I buy you a drink?”

She raised an eyebrow. “Are you old enough to drink?”

Sam grinned. “ID’s are not a problem.” He chuckled then. “Of course, if you’re Topper, you’d just pull whatever you want out of your hat, right? Get me a Long Island?”

She gave a strained smile. “I’d be happy to, assuming I had the right hat…”

Sam shook his head. “Nice try, but wrong answer. You got the costume perfect, but the real Topper can use any hat-top hats, bowlers, sombreros. And she never does requests.” Sam grinned further. “Besides, she retired that outfit when she quit the Justice Department.”

“Aces High is having a costume party. So sue me.” She put her hands on her hips. “So, how do you know so much about the ‘real’ Topper? Ace groupie?”

“Nah,” Sam shook his head, “someone donated a bunch of back issues of Aces! to the J-town orphanage. Topper was on the cover in the eighties. Had a pinup and everything.” Sam shrugged. “Haven’t made the cover yet myself, but we aces like to keep tabs on each other.”

She arched the same eyebrow. “New ace, huh?” Her eyes flicked over him. “So who are you then, the Artful Dodger?”

“That’s sort of the look I was going for,” Sam said, still smiling, “but actually, you can call me Swash.”

“Swash?”

“Well, it’s either that or ‘His Nibs,’ but even a goth can only be so pretentious.” He held up his ungloved right hand, which had been hidden behind his sketchbook. “Pardon me if I don’t shake, but I’m a little inky right now.”

He watched her eyes start, a pretty cerulean blue, as she took note of his hand, which was stained with that shade and several others beneath his hooked black-enameled Fu Manchu manicure. It wasn’t a joker, but it still had shock value, like an unexpected tongue-stud.

Sam laid his sketchbook flat, displaying the Art Nouveau letters and dancing pumpkins of the menu he’d been re-illuminating. He flexed his fingers, letting a drop of ink come to the tip of each split sharpened crow-quill pointed nail, glanced to Hastet’s nameless appetizer, then flipped to a fresh page and clawed down it. A twitch here, a slash there, a drop of the chartreuse of revulsion and the pale lavender of disquiet, and he’d pretty accurately captured his impression of the tentacular delight. He tossed in a few word balloons with the squidlets saying, “Eat me!” instead of “Help me!” then added a banner borne aloft by Cupidthulhu putti with a caption in dramatically dripping Salamanca script: “Dare you partake of LOVECRAFT’S MADNESS?”

With one more jig of his thumb, he signed it Swash. “See?” He used his gloved left hand to turn the book around. “Not just my ace name, but my artist’s signature too.” He blotted the nails of his right on one of Hastet’s no-longer-immaculately-white napkins. “Like I said, ID’s are not a problem.”

The woman applauded lightly. “Nice trick.”

“Thanks.” Sam grinned.

“Can I have my hat back now?”

He picked up his spare glove and slipped it on, sliding his fingertips into the special pencap sheathes. “Uh, you’re wearing it.” He shook his cuff so the lace fell properly, black cobwebs on black, stealing a glance up from beneath the brim of his own top hat.

“No, I think you’re wearing it.” She gestured to the bar. “About a half hour ago, when the waiter dropped his tray? Someone bumped into me and knocked my hat off.”

Sam remembered the loud and spectacular crash, which had not only made him jump and squirt ink all over a page, ruining one of his sketches, but had also had caused him to dig in his nails, injecting pigment into several pages previous, destroying hours of work. Which in fact was why he was still here, recopying pages and hitting up Hastet for snacks to refill his ink reservoirs. “And…?”

“And my grandfather was a stage magician. I know all about misdirection.” She looked pointedly at a spot a few inches above his eyes. “Likewise the bump-and-switch.” She reached up and tapped her hat. “And while this is the same size and vintage as the one I came in with-even the same haberdasher’s mark-it’s not the same hat.”

Sam grimaced. He should have known it was something more than just mutual admiration of gothic finery. “If you wanted to look at my hat…” He doffed it, stray bits of blond mane falling into his face, “… all you had to do was ask.” He extended it to her. “Was yours a rental prop?”

“No,” she said coldly, grasping the brim, “but it had a lot of sentimental value.” She then thrust her arm inside his hat, up to the elbow. Her hand came out the other end, where the crown was partially detached, becoming even more detached as she did so, and Sam watched as her expression changed, from a look of smug satisfaction, to puzzlement, then to worry as her painted nails fumbled at the air, to red-faced embarrassment as she caught sight of them over the brim of the hat. “Wha-?”

Something in her expression made him flash back to the teenage girl on the cover of Aces! and he realized that, with the exception of Golden Boy, most aces didn’t stay unchanged since the early eighties. “Wait a second,” Sam said, “you really are Topper, aren’t you?” She looked at him and that look cinched it. “That article, it was wrong, right? SCARE disinformation. Your ace crutch isn’t just any hat, or a top hat, it’s one top hat in particular, the one you got from your grandfather. You hid it inside that sombrero and-”

“Not so loud!” she hissed, withdrawing her arm from his hat and abruptly sitting next to him. “I don’t want everyone to- What’s the matter?”

Sam gritted his teeth to keep from screaming. “You’re sitting on my tail!”

She looked. “Uh, it’s a nice tail coat but…”

Sam twitched his real tail, hidden down the sheath in the left-hand train of his own swallowtail coat where it had been stretched out in the booth, and Topper’s eyes started. She abruptly raised back up so he could yank it under himself, having a moment of trouble as it got tangled with the tails of her coat and the velvet of the upholstery, but at last he got it situated. “My Jokertown membership card, a little joker to go with my deuce.” He blinked back the pain, even though his tail was still smarting. “Okay, now you know my secret too.”

She sighed. “I’m sorry. I won’t tell if you won’t tell.” She grimaced and covered her eyes with one hand, shaking her head softly. “Good god, if Jay ever finds out that I’ve lost my hat, I’ll never hear the end of it…”

“Hastet’s Jay?”

She dropped her hand and nodded. “I work for his agency.”

Sam glanced down at her fishnets through the hole in his hat. “What sort of agency…?”

She follow his gaze, then muttered, “There was a reason I retired this costume…” Then she glared at him. “Detective agency. Gads, I work for Popinjay, not Fortunato.” She looked then at Sam’s top hat, with its crown falling out, and gave a sheepish grin that made her look years younger. “Sorry about that…” She glanced around the restaurant. “Do you see any other top hats?”

Sam looked himself. Starfields was packed, and given the night, he saw every sort of hat imaginable, from the odd dozen ostrich-plumed cavalier hats worn by the Dr. Tachyon lookalike waiters to representational foam rubber creations liberated from the Theatre District, looking to be cast-offs from last month’s Wild Card Follies everything from the Great Ape climbing the Empire State Building to Dr. Tod’s flaming blimp. But no top hats.

“Right now?” He smoothed his hair back with one velvet glove and replaced his battered hat with the other, pushing the crown inside. “Excepting mine and the one you’re wearing, no.”

She bit her lower lip. “Earlier?”

Sam thought back. “Several. Let me look…” He picked up his sketchbook, blowing once across it so that the snot-trails from the Salamanca script would be dry, then flipped back past the buffer of blank pages he’d left to protect from bleed-through until he got to the ruined section. He pried open the last two sheets, still damp from the accident, revealing a giant multicolored Rorschach blot of sprayed ink, one hue bleeding into the next, predominantly the shocking pink of surprise. But underneath that, still visible on the lefthand page, were a series of sketches, including an image of the Starfields bar just minutes before the crash. Counting top hats, there were seven individuals of note, the first six wearing tail coats, the last without.

First was Topper, holding a martini, perched at the edge of the bar in her fishnets. Next, a short ways down, was a crippled boy with polio crutches. Then came a young man with a blond mane and velvet gloves, the very image of Sam himself, turned and talking to a darkly handsome man with black hair and a permanent five-o’-clock shadow, fiddling with a small hand-held black box. Then there was a set of improbably wide shoulders, facing the bar and taking up at least three seats, the top hat worn atop a perfectly average, even narrow, head. Next a pale horse-faced giant with a long white goatee and a spiked and spiraled Mohawk, his top hat artfully and absurdly impaled on the twisted spikes. Then, finally, there was a fetish girl, a long, lithe, willowy woman, thin as a supermodel and almost as tall, dressed head to toe in latex. Her catsuit and platform-soled dominatrix boots were all of a piece, broken only by buckles and straps, and her face was hidden by a pantomime mask, a single tear on one cheek. This was backed by long honey blond tresses and topped with a vintage silk top hat.

“Here.” Sam handed the book to Topper.

She scrutinized the page like a rogues gallery. “Do you know any of these people?”

“Everyone except the women on the ends.” Sam paused. “Though I’m getting to know the one of them.”

Topper looked at him, and their proximity, and smirked. “Don’t push it. I’m old enough to be your babysitter.”

Sam shrugged. “I grew up in an orphanage. I never had a babysitter.” He paused. “Though I did have fantasies.”

Topper didn’t touch this, focusing instead on the mystery woman. “So, the Vinyl Vixen here-any idea who she is? Is that an ace uniform? A joker disguise? A Halloween costume? A really kinky fashion statement?”

Sam shrugged. “All of the above? Go to bondage night at the Dead Nicholas and that’s a pretty common look.” Then he added, “I do their club flyers.”

“Is it just me, or does it look like she has an Adam’s apple under the latex?” Topper looked closer at the illustration. “Or is that an inkblot?”

“Hard to tell. When I sketch fast, I just-” He caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of one eye, a flash of silver buckles and golden hair. “Though maybe you could just ask Latex Lass yourself.” He pointed across the restaurant to where the same woman was coming out of the ladies room.

Topper looked, then shoved his sketchbook into his hands, standing up and rushing from the booth. Or really, attempting to. Sam felt a tug on his tail, and realized that when he’d tucked it under himself for safe keeping, he’d taken Topper’s along with it, the cloth ones on her coat. The antique wool snapped back like a pair of suspenders in a vaudeville act, and Topper screeched, over-balancing on her stiletto heels, clawing to save herself, grabbing the tablecloth. Silverware, glassware, and the prodigious greenness of Hastet’s tentacled appetizer clattered down atop her as Sam forewent chivalry to protect his sketchbook, springing back out of the way and halfway atop the booth.

There was, as with all such accidents, a swift silence, followed by even swifter sarcastic applause. Then Takisian Three Musketeers extras were helping Topper to her feet and offering words of solicitous concern while Fetish Girl crossed Starfields’ star-spangled foyer, pushed open the nebula-frosted glass panels of the entrance, and made her exit. Topper gave a strangled shriek of protest, attempting to evade the well meaning interference of the wait staff, and sprinted for the crack in the stars as fast as petite legs in stiletto heels could carry her.

Sam struggled across the wreckage of tablecloth and hors d’oeuvres and was faced with a snap decision: He could stay, finish his work, and try to explain the mess to Hastet, or he could follow Topper. It was an easy choice. Besides which, Hastet was Takisian, and as such, she knew that chivalry had its demands, as did attractive women in fishnet stockings. And while Sam wasn’t tall, he was taller than Topper, and he caught up with her just as she passed through the doors. He leapt through the gap in the nebula after her, his tail pinging the edge of the glass, then it was down the stairs, no waiting for the elevator, and out to the sidewalk.

Topper took three steps outside and looked up and down the street, then back at him. “Where is she?”

Sam looked too, taking in the bustle of Park Row and trying to spot a latex-clad supermodel in a vintage top hat, then shook his head. “Gone. I’m sorry, I-”

“Do you have any idea where she went?”

Sam shook his head again. “No.” Then he paused. “Or actually, yes. I’m pretty certain I do. Follow me.” Topper looked ready to grasp at the slimmest hope, and Sam gave it to her. “Taxi!” he shouted, jumping out into the street and flagging one down.

Sam went into chivalry overdrive, opening the door for Topper, who piled in, with him following.

The driver had a beard and a turban and a wide smile. “What is your destination on this fine night, oh most-” The man stopped, goggling in horror at Topper, as if she’d just sprouted an extra head.

Sam looked. She had. Well, actually no, but the effect was remarkably similar, one of the cephalopod confections caught in her curls, staring at the driver with the same wide-eyed expression, like Father Squid being subjected to an unexpected proctology exam.

It was against Sam’s better judgement, but if he’d learned one thing growing up in Jokertown, it was this: Sometimes you had to freak the nats. Plus Hastet expected him to taste her creations, not just draw them, so the time had come to bite the bullet, or at least the squid.

Sam removed it from Topper’s curls and popped the pirouline into his mouth, biting down. It was crunchy and spicy-sweet, a little like Japanese spider roll, mixed with the dry caraway flavor of kimmel cracker. Then his eyes began to water. Takisian Surprise was right! Hastet had spiked the guacamole with wasabi or some otherworldly equivalent.

Topper looked at him. “Edible?”

Sam swallowed and thumped his chest. “Like Candy Mandy’s fingers.” He wiped the tears with the back of his glove. “Girl I knew back at Jokertown High. Edible fingers. Really.”

There was really no response to this, and Topper didn’t try to make one. Half the Jokertown stories were ‘No, really’ bullshit, and the other were unbelievable, but still true.

The driver was still staring his own rectal-examination stare, and Sam had a bad feeling in his own tail, but pressed ahead anyway, smiling as if nothing could be more natural. “Jokertown, please. Club Chaos.”

At last the cabby’s expression changed, going from a mask of shocked horror to righteous indignation. “This cab, by the Light of Allah, does not go to the abode of the unclean!”

“What if we gave you some unclean money?”

The mask faltered for a moment. “How much?”

“Five hundred bucks,” said Topper.

“Let me see it.”

“Fine.” Topper took her hat off and started to reach inside, then stopped. “Oh shit-I left my wallet in my other hat.” She looked to Sam.

He shrugged. “Don’t look at me. I don’t carry that sort of money.”

“Can’t you…” She wiggled her nails and gestured towards Sam’s sketchbook.

Forge five hundred dollars on the fly? And without the right paper? “I don’t think so.”

“Get out of my cab. Allah spits on jokers and liars.”

Sam thought, remembering the rantings of the Nur, who’d glowed as green as if he’d swallowed a Lite Brite set, which seemed pretty close to a joker by most people’s definitions. “If I remember correctly, Allah thinks aces are just spiffy.” Sam stripped off his right glove and brought five beads of Nur-green ink to the tip of his nibs, luminous poison green, the color he’d always associated with malice. “See these, dickweed? Allah gave me poison claws, and if you don’t take this fucking cab to Club Chaos before I can say ‘Allah Akbar,’ Allah tells me I get to poison your ass dead.”

“Allah Akbar!” the cabbie agreed fervently and Sam nearly got whiplash as fast as they took off down the street.

Topper stared at him, and Sam didn’t know whether he’d just crossed the line to become her knight in shining armor or a dangerous psychopath-likely something of both-and he wondered how long he could bluff a religious fanatic with what amounted to a handful of fountain pens.

Topper turned to the cabbie. “I’ll also have you know that I’m a federal agent, or at least I used to be. You move so much as a finger towards that gun under your seat, I’ll drop you before poison boy here even gets in a scratch.” She had one of her stiletto heels off in her hand, pressed into the vinyl in back of the cabbie’s seat. “That okay?”

“Allah Akbar!” the cabbie swore, turning left on Chatham Square and into Chinatown, and left again with a squeal of tires onto Confucius Place.

Conventional wisdom said it took only three minutes to get from the Village to J-Town, but Confucius said that men fearing for their lives could get there in less than two, even when all they were threatened with was stiletto heels and fountain pens. “With the grace of Allah, we are here!” They screeched to a stop in front of Club Chaos. “Do not harm me, oh most beloved of Allah!”

“Stay where you are,” Topper told the cabbie, opening her own door, and Sam did the same with his, wiping his nails clean on the headliner as he exited, leaving the cabbie with the message, in elegant sihafa script, Allah says you’re a dickweed. Actually, it was probably something more like, Allah, the compassionate and most merciful, says you’re a putrescent camel penis steeped in mint-fennel sauce, but most of Sam’s Arabic came from falafel house menus.

The cab sped off the moment the doors were shut and Topper grimaced. “Idiot,” she said, balancing flamingo-style as she replaced her shoe.

Sam didn’t know if she were referring to him or the cabbie, and didn’t ask. “Did we just commit a felony?”

“Do you actually have poisonous claws?”

“No.”

“Then no.” She shrugged. “I came closer to it, but I never actually said I had a gun, and I have friends in the Justice Department.” She walked over to him and looked up at the Club Chaos sign, the latest work of the Jokertown Redevelopment Agency. In place of the broken and blighted marquee of the long defunct Chaos Club, there now stood a fifty-foot tall neon version of the new club’s owner, veteran joker comedian, Chaos, back after many lucrative years in Vegas (and a split with his old partner, Cosmos), bringing some of the glitter and tinsel with him to mix with the city’s matching funds. He juggled spaceships and planets with his six arms, while below his feet, sporting considerably less neon, was a television van plastered with a twirling Mtv logo. A huge mass of teenage girls, most of them nats, were standing behind police barricades while a single, albeit large and brown-scaled, police officer attempted to keep them in line. The joke of it was, they were all dressed like Topper-top hats, tail coats, and more than half of them had figured out that fishnets were the way to complete the ensemble, even those who should have considered something else.

Topper stopped and did a double take. Then turned to Sam. “When did my outfit suddenly come into fashion?”

Sam felt a bit uneasy. “Um, it didn’t. I think my outfit came into fashion.”

“Come again?”

“Ever hear of The Jokertown Boys?”

She paused. “They’re a gang, right? Like the Werewolves or the Egrets?”

“Um, no.” Sam reached to the back of his portfolio and pulled out a flier done in the Bauhaus style, with blocky Bremen lettering that had required cutting his thumbnails square. He passed it to Topper and let her read it:

8 PM, Saturday, October 27th

Club Chaos!

The Jokertown Boys

CD Release Party

‘Top Hat, White Tie, and Tails’

Wear Yours and Get in Free!

Below that was a pen-and-ink portrait of the five guys in formalwear from the bar, facing right and sporting canes and white gloves, the pose something Sam had modeled after one of the old posters for Grand Hotel.

Topper looked to Sam and blinked. “You’re in the band?”

“No, I just live with them. I sang backup on a couple tracks, that’s all.” Sam pointed to illustration. “People mistake us all the time, but that’s my brother, Roger.”

“So that wasn’t you by the bar?” Topper scrutinized the flyer, then bit her lip. “You know, except for the guy with the shoulders, they look awfully nat for Jokertown.”

“Looks can be deceiving.” Sam brushed his tail in its swallow-tail sheath against Topper’s leg. “Trust me. They’re all jokers and they’re all from J-town.” He paused. “Well, Dirk there’s from the Village, and we’ve been renting the upstairs of his mom’s shop since we left the orphanage. But Village People? Don’t think so.” He looked at the van, watching a guy in a wizard hat atop it working the crowd, and realized it was Carson Daly. “Since when did they hook up with Mtv?”

There came a squeal from the line of girls and a louder one as he made the mistake of looking, and Sam came to a sudden grim realization: Once again, his fraternal resemblance had carried too far.

“It’s Roger!” screamed a girl in a domino mask, and her screams were picked up by the next teenybopper in line, and the next, like a chorus of howler monkeys at the zoo: “Roger!” “Roger!” “Roger, we love you!” The crowd pressed forward and the barricade overturned, the girls trampling the scaled police officer in their mad rush.

It wasn’t the Jokertown Riots, or the Wild Hunt from the Rox War, but it was the closest thing Sam had ever experienced to either. Screaming girls. Clawing girls. A huge slavering hound’s muzzle thrust in his face. “I’m not Roger, I’m his brother!” Sam protested, but the clawing and screaming and tearing at his clothes continued until Topper and the scaled police officer, who’d somehow crawled under the crowd, linked arms before him and held them back, bellowing things about the NYPD and federal agents.

Then autograph books were waved in his face past them. This, at least, was something he could deal with. Roger, he signed, and Roger!!!, and To my dearest fan, and then he was confronted by part of the hunger and madness of the Rox War made flesh, the drooling, panting muzzle of one of the Gabriel hounds, white fangs glistening, fierce and sharp. Except the hound had bows in its hair and was holding an autograph book, and Sam realized he was looking at a joker fangirl with the head of an afghan. He signed all five band members’ names in her book simultaneously, one with each digit: Roger, Jim, Alec, Dirk and Paul, each signature in the respective hand, then did a second line with their wild card manes: Ravenstone, Grimcrack, Alicorn, Atlas and Pretty Paulie, with extra hearts and smiley faces.

Then Topper was shoved aside by sheer bulk. “Sign my breasts!” screamed an obese nat girl who’d exceeded the recommended weight allowance of her halter top.

Sam did not want to scratch her-not that her fellow autograph-seekers had any such reservations when it came to him-but it was not as if these girls were jokerphobic anyway, so he flexed the toes of his left foot, letting his nails piss ink into his Doc Marten, then slipped his tail out of its sheath, dunked it into the impromptu inkwell, and whipped it up and around and through the flourishes of Japanese brushwork. Roger he wrote on the right breast and Ravenstone on the left.

“I’m going to have it tattooed in!” the girl squealed.

Her fellow fanatics howled for more, surging through the gap, then one grabbed his tail and two others grabbed his arms, wrestling him for his sketchbook, and a fourth clawed for his face, snatching off his hat. Then she gasped in shock. “His eyes are blue!” she screamed. “Both of them! And where are his cute little horns?”

“Where’s the raven?” demanded another.

“Wait a second,” said the girl behind him, “since when does Ravenstone have a tail? And wouldn’t it be a devil tail? This is a lion’s tail? What sort of rip is this?”

“I read about him in TeenBeat!” screamed a slightly more knowledgeable fangirl. “That’s Roger’s brother, Swish!”

“That’s Swash!” Sam roared, snatching his hat back and jamming it on, wresting away his sketchbook, and jerking his tail free. The crowd fell back, the scaled police officer shouting for the girls to get their butts behind the barricade. Sam lashed his tail, splashing drops of ink, and stomped forward, his coat torn, his left boot squishy, his hatjammed down around his ears. He hoped Roger had brought spare socks.

Topper scanned the crowd as they walked past. “Any sign of Bondage Babe?” Even with the stiletto heels, she wasn’t tall enough to see more than the teenyboppers just behind the barricades.

“You mean Fetish Girl?” Sam wasn’t much taller than Topper himself. “Not that I can see. Not that that means much.” He shepherded Topper around the side of the building, past a few more autograph seekers, drying off his tail by painting the Chinese characters for Luck, Joy and Get-a-Life on the proffered books.

“You think she’s inside with the band?”

Sam just shrugged, going up the steps to the stage door. There was a bouncer who blocked it, via the simple expedient of being the same size and shape. “Passes?” he asked in a dull monotone.

Topper took off her hat and started to reach inside, then stopped and looked to Sam.

“Check the doorlist. Sam Washburn and…” He glanced to Topper. He didn’t even know her real name.

“Melissa Blackwood,” Topper supplied.

The doorman looked. “You’re on it, she’s not.”

“Let me see.” The doorman did, and Sam ran a finger down it, not very impressed. Childish roundhand, two steps from Palmer method. “Right here, in the middle.” He tapped the list, dotting the iin Melissa.

The doorman checked again and it was a testimony to his dullness or his professionalism that he just shrugged and stepped aside, crossing them off and handing them passes once Sam flashed him his driver’s license and Topper flashed some leg.

The back of Club Chaos was an old hemp house, an off-Broadway theatre unchanged since the thirties except for facelifts out front, with nothing else special about it, except for the welcome. “Hey, look everyone, it’s His Nibs!” Alec Harner, alias Alicorn, the lead guitarist, waved, easy to spot by virtue of him being something over seven feet tall, not counting the three-foot ice blond spiked Mohawk, which easily put him over ten.

Paul O’Nealy, alias Pretty Paulie, the main vocalist, swung forward on his polio crutches, the lines of his tux somewhat spoiled by the elaborate armature of head, shoulder, back, arm and leg braces necessitated by his rubberized skeleton. With a top hat covering his perpetually unruly brown hair, this and his sweet smile made him look more than a bit like Tiny Tim, posterchild for cute sick boys everywhere-despite the fact that he stood around six feet, depending on how he adjusted his braces that morning. “Sam! I thought you were stuck at Starfields till you redid those menus.”

“Change of plans. Hastet’s not going to find anyone else who can do Takisian calligraphy on short notice, and so long as I get everything there before brunch tomorrow, she won’t kill me.”

“You need to find a different job.” Jim Krakowiez, alias Gimcrack, the band’s keyboardist and tech wizard, looked concerned and not at all a joker, with black hair, intense green eyes, and a permanent five-o’-clock shadow that also made him look far older than his nineteen years. However, looks could be deceiving. Despite the male model face and the tall, toned and perfectly muscled nat body that went with it, the wild card had touched him deep inside his head, making him possibly the most gullible man in the universe, and certainly the most literal-minded. “I know Takisians take their honor seriously, but she shouldn’t kill you just because you messed up a menu. That’s not right and it wasn’t your fault anyway.” He blanched then. “Did she kill the waiter? The one who tripped?”

“No, Jim, he’s fine.” Sam patted his friend on the arm. “Hastet’s not really going to kill me.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“Looks like someone tried to.” Roger stood in the shadows of the proscenium, looking like a young Odin, with a patch over his left eye, and his pet raven, Lenore, on his right glove. “Sweet Joker-Jesus, Sam, what happened to you?”

Sam sighed, pulling up on his sleeve where the seam had been ripped out at the shoulder. “Some of your fans just tried to play Stretch Armstrong with me.”

“Hey, that’s my shtick!” Paul protested.

Sam ignored him, turning to his brother. “What the fuck’s going on out there?”

“It’s a long and complicated tale,” Roger began, coming forward from the shadows. “I’m not certain where to start…”

“Britney Spears got food poisoning!” Alec exclaimed, then started to laugh, nearly braying. “Puked Pepsi all over Bob Dole!”

Paul giggled, then made a strangled ralphing noise, followed by a perfectly inflected, girlish, “Oops! I did it again!” The wild card had elasticized his vocal cords along with his bones, giving even more justification for his nickname, a talent for mimicry rivaled only by his vocal range. “Yeah, and she was supposed to be over at Radio City tonight doing the Halloween show for Mtv!”

Alec nodded wildly, his Mohawk bobbing like a sail. “But, puking Britney-they had to cancel.”

“And our video just trashed everyone on Total Request Live!” Paul exclaimed, bouncing up and down on his crutches.

Alec continued to nod, the motion revealing that the bowsprit of his coiffure was actually a spiraled ivory horn, hidden like the Purloined Letter just below his forelock. “And Britney said she thought Paul was cute!”

Paul grinned from ear to ear-literally. “And we were having a concert tonight anyway, so they moved the show here!”

“In a nutshell… yes.” Roger stroked Lenore, smoothing down her ruffled feathers and keeping a tight hold on her jesses. “Chaos told us the deal when we got back from dinner.”

It was all a little bit much to take at once, surreal in fact, and Sam just took it in stride when a parade of thirty women, all dressed like Topper, filed by in back of the band.

“The Rockettes,” Jim explained. “Mtv said if they paid for them, they were going to use them, and they already know all the Irving Berlin numbers anyway.” Jim smiled. “We didn’t see the nutshell Roger said they came in, but I’m guessing it was a big one, kind of like the giant flying seashell Dr. Tachyon uses.”

“Oh,” said Sam. Topper just stood there in stunned silence, watching the seemingly endless display of top hats.

Alec angled his Mohawk towards her and stroked his equally long, silky and silly goatee. “You’re not a Rockette, are you?” He loomed over Sam. “Going to introduce us to your friend, Swash?”

“Uh, yeah.” Sam shook his head, realizing he’d been forgetting his manners. “Guys, this is Topper. The ace.”

“Alec,” said Alec, bending down to shake hands, “the joker.” Their size differential made them look like Teniel’s illustration of Alice and the Unicorn, except Alec was only horse-faced in the nat sense and Alice didn’t wear a top hat and fishnets. “Or ‘Alicorn,’ if you want my joker name.”

“Nice to meet you,” she said, his hand enveloping hers as they shook. “I remember seeing you at Starfields.” Sam saw her glance to Alec’s immense Mohawk-impaled top hat and immediately discount the possibility.

“People tend to do that,” Alec remarked as he straightened back up and uncricked his back. “It’s the height.”

Topper nodded. “People overlook me. Same reason.”

“That’s not true,” said Jim. “Paul kept looking at your legs. He said they looked totally hot, which kinda confuses me, ’cause in fishnets you’d expect they’d be cool.”

“Jim!” Paul exclaimed, his voice jumping three octaves. Then he looked to Topper, blushing furiously. “Pardon me while I curl up into a ball and die of embarrassment…” He glanced to Jim. “No, Jim. I’m not really going to. It’s just a metaphor. People don’t really die of embarrassment.”

“Yes they do!” Jim protested. “Don’t you remember Margie? From the orphanage? Five years ago she got her period and stained her choir robe and she said, ‘Oh God, I’m so embarrassed, I’m going to die!’ Then she did die, right there next to us in the middle of church. She drew the black queen, and Father Squid said it was embarrassment that made her card turn, just like she said. And he had a whole sermon next Sunday about the evils of shame and how it kills jokers.” Jim’s lip began to quiver. “And I’ve seen you curl up into a ball. You can even bounce.”

Paul gave Jim a look halfway between sympathy and exasperation. “It’s okay, Jim. I’m not going to die. And shame doesn’t really kill jokers. Usually.” He paused then, taking a deep breath. “And none of us are latents anymore anyway. Even Roger’s drawn his card.”

“I haven’t,” said Jim, blinking at tears. “I’m still a completely normal…”

“Jim, you’re an ace. A crazy powerful one.”

“Am not.”

“Are too.”

“Am not,” Jim insisted.

Paul let it drop, and there was an uncomfortable silence, which Roger broke with the rolling tones of a born showman: “I believe we were in the middle of introductions. If I may, allow me to introduce Jim and Paul, alias Gimcrack and Pretty Paulie. And this is my assistant, Lenore,” he said, gesturing to his raven. “While as for myself…” Roger held up his left hand, showed the glove’s palm then the back, then with a flourish, produced a business card from thin air.

Lenore snatched it from him, holding the card in her beak.

“Give it to the nice lady, Lenore,” Roger coaxed, holding the raven towards Topper. “Give it.”

Lenore looked at Topper, then at Roger, then defiantly took the card in one claw and began to shred it into confetti. Roger caught it in his left hand, squeezed tight, then opened it with a flourish, presenting the card to Topper, miraculously restored, if missing a corner. “For you, my good lady. The Amazing Ravenstone, at your service.”

She accepted it with a smile. “A fellow conjurer, I see.”

“But nowhere near your level of skill, I’m afraid.” He retrieved the last corner from Lenore’s beak. “I’m afraid my ace at present only extends to parlor magic. But I’m working to expand my repertoire.” He handed the torn corner to Topper. “Would that I had your skill. Or that of your grandfather.”

“Likewise,” Topper said, putting the missing corner to the card and seeing that they matched. “I only pull rabbits out of my hat, not tigers.”

“The legendary Blackwood Conjure…” Roger gave a wry smile. “A most impressive feat, especially since Lafayette Blackwood accomplished it without apparent access to curtain, trap door, or gimmicked stand-and this years before the advent of the wild card.” Roger gave her a sidelong glance from his unpatched eye. “I know that almost all his props and effects were destroyed in a fire, but did he ever by any chance pass on the secret personally?”

“Grandpa took it to his grave, I’m afraid.” Topper gave a sad shake of her head. “He always said that a magician’s secrets were meant to be lost, stolen, or traded for one equal, never given out-right or sold for cheap.”

Roger nodded, then quoted, “‘For to do so would cheapen the magic and destroy the wonder, and the world needs mysteries, now more than ever.’”

Jim applauded wildly, then smiled at Topper. “That was the end of the ‘History of Magic’ spiel he gave when we worked at Dutton’s Magic and Novelty Shop.” Jim smiled wider. “Roger always said it just before trying to sell people ‘Topper’s Big Box of Ace Magic Tricks.’ He got a commission.”

“Oh God,” said Topper, “they’re still selling those? I thought the license expired years ago.”

“Mr. Dutton bought up the warehouse. He told us to jack the price and call them collectibles, and if we could unload them, we got an extra twenty percent.” Jim smiled. “I worked there too. I sold more X-ray specs than any other employee.”

Roger glared. “That’s because you used your ace to make them actually work, Jim.”

“I did not,” Jim protested. “They work just fine for anybody, so long as you adjust them right, and it’s not my fault if people keep breaking them after they leave the store.”

“Jim, regular people can’t see through walls.”

“Sure they can. All they need are X-ray glasses. Or windows.” Jim glared at Roger. “You said the same thing when we were kids and you were upset because your sea monkeys didn’t look like the ones on the package and mine did. Just because I know how to follow directions and can get products to work the way they’re supposed to doesn’t make me an ace.”

Roger left the statement unchallenged, as did Sam. There was no point in arguing with Jim, especially when he got in a mood, since the flipside of absolute gullibility and literal-mindedness was absolute faith, and when the universe catered to your belief in it, this was not necessarily misplaced. Even if that belief was mostly in the outrageous promises of advertising, particularly the products in the backs of comic books and supermarket tabloids.

Jim still looked hurt. “You should remember what it’s like, Roger. You were a latent too, before the wild card gave you a black eye.”

Topper looked at Roger, incredulous. “A black eye?”

Roger nodded. “Jim is being accurate here. I got a black eye.” Roger raised his hand and flipped up his eyepatch. His left eye was black, totally black, without trace of white or iris. “As you can see,” Roger said with a wink before hiding the eye again, “Raven-stone is not just my stage name or my nom de ace,” He tapped the brim of his hat, “but also my nom de joker.”

Topper looked at his hat. “Nice hat,” she remarked. “Finchley’s Fifth Avenue?”

“Of course,” said Roger. “The classic magician’s hat. And a good old New York firm too.”

“May I see it? I collect hats.”

“You and Cameo should talk,” Paul remarked.

“Our costume designer,” Roger explained, doffing his hat to reveal a pair of small black horns. “She also collects. Though not just hats.” He handed his to Topper. “She found our costumes for the show.”

“Or made them,” Alec added. “Hard to find my size, even in Jokertown.”

“And she wouldn’t punch holes in a vintage number anyway,” Roger pointed out. “She’d consider it murder.” His eye flicked to Sam’s mangled hat. “I suggest you ask for a loaner, Sam. We may want to drag you on stage later and I can’t have my brother dressed like that.”

“On stage? Oh please.”

“You’re our cover artist. Take your bows.” He smirked. “Besides, we may need a backup singer, in case Alec suddenly gets hoarse…”

“Please God no…” said Alec.

Sam was in agreement. “I don’t sing that well, Roger.”

“Better than Alec would,” Roger said. “Besides, you know all the songs.”

“Thank you,” said Topper, returning Roger’s hat and saving Sam from further argument. “May I?” Jim and Paul showed her their hats as well, but Sam knew from her expression that theirs weren’t hers either. “Of course,” she added, “the hat thing is just a hobby. I was hoping you boys could help me with something else. I’m a private investigator, and I was looking for a woman you may have seen at Starfields-who incidentally also wears a top hat. Swash, could you show them your illustration?”

Sam took his cue and opened the sketchbook. The ink had smeared even more and the pages were almost glued together, bits of paper tearing off in little shreds, but at last he showed them the sketch of the Vinyl Vixen.

“I remember her,” said Jim. “Paul said she was totally hot too. But that made sense, ’cause she’s wearing all that latex.”

Paul blushed slightly. “So I’ve got a thing for rubber. Go figure.”

Roger shrugged. “If I recall, she stumbled into the waiter. Likely couldn’t see much with that mask. I helped her up and returned her hat, and last I saw, she ran off for the ladies room, presumably to wash off the Takisian margarita he’d spilled down her back.”

“Presumably,” Topper said.

“I bet she was a fan,” Alec said. “She kept looking at you, Roger, like she was thinking about asking for your autograph.”

“Roger was looking at you the same way,” Jim told Topper.

Roger gave Jim a withering look, then glanced to Topper. “Well, I’ll admit, I am a fan. Though mostly of your grandfather. The man was amazing.”

“So are a number of things,” Topper said, glancing to Roger, then Sam. “Joker-deuce brothers. The odds are what? One in a thousand? Ten thousand?”

“Somewhere in there.” Roger flashed his devilish smile. “Scarce as hen’s teeth and twice as weird.”

“Not that we’re complaining,” Sam added. “The Croyd outbreak killed our parents and left us infected and unadoptable. Same with lots of kids, actually. After I drew my card, I was afraid I was going to lose Roger. After all, look at the odds.”

“We survived. That’s what counts.” Roger stroked Lenore’s feathers. “And the same with some of our friends from the orphanage.” He nodded to Jim, Alec and Paul.

“We didn’t just survive-we’re freakin’ huge!” This last was said, without apparent irony, by Dirk Swenson, alias Atlas, drummer for the Jokertown Boys, who despite a face with delicate, almost Takisian, features, had shoulders about as wide as he was tall, with muscles to match. “I just carried Jim’s piano out on stage and snuck a peek through the curtains and you won’t believe how many girls are out there!”

“And let us not forget our loud friend from the New York School for the Arts…” Roger said in an aside to Topper.

Dirk was loud in more than one sense of the word. He’d swapped out of his custom tail coat and tux shirt and into a sun-burst tie-die, presumably for the set up, and Sam wondered if the rumors were true, that he was Starshine’s lovechild. Certainly they had the same fashion sense, thought that just might be due to the fact that the muscleboy had been raised following the Grateful Dead until Jerry Garcia died and Dirk’s mom had moved back to the Village to take over The Cosmic Pumpkin.

“I can’t freakin’ believe it!” Dirk boomed. “This is absolutely wild!”

Sam was in agreement, but from a slightly different angle, since ‘wild’ was a pretty accurate description of the nat girls they’d encountered out front.

“Dirk?” Roger said, getting his attention. “Allow me to introduce you to Topper, the famous ace conjurer. Topper, Dirk, our piano-lifting drummer. Dirk, I need you to get back into costume before we do a sound check, but before you do, Topper was wondering if you’d seen the woman in vinyl from the bar.” He pointed to Sam’s illustration.

“Oh, yeah, Bondage Girl,” said Dirk, looking at the illustration. “She was hot.”

“We’ve established that,” Topper said. “Do you know her? Did she by any chance say anything?”

“Nah,” said Dirk, “I think she was doing the mime trip. But I gave her one of the flyers Sam did for the show. I hope she gets in,” he added, “Chaos said it’s, like, going to be standing room only, and the shows around us’ll have to deal with our overflow.”

“The toilets are going to back up?” asked Jim.

“Nah,” said Dirk, “that’s theatre talk. Means girls who can’t get in will go to other clubs.”

Topper looked more than slightly alarmed at this, but only said, “Is that your coat and hat over there? Let me get them for you.”

“Cool. Thanks.” Dirk pulled of his tie-die, revealing musculature like a classical statue of Atlas reinterpreted by an eighties comic book artist, while Topper went to where his ordinary hat and incredibly huge shirt and jacket had been laid over an amp. She came back with them, but Sam could tell from her look that Dirk’s hat had been eliminated from the running as well.

“Here you go,” she said, handing him his clothes. “Mind if we go sneak a peek at the audience? I don’t think I’ve ever seen this many… girls… in one place ever before, and I’d like to see them all before the fire marshal turns anyone away.”

“Yeah, go greet my fans,” Sam said, pulling at the lining hanging out of the torn pocket of his coat.

“Sure,” Roger said, “we need to go over some stuff anyway. Glad you could make it after all-and nice to meet you.” Roger tipped his hat to Topper and he and the boys went over to the stage area and started a sound check. Meanwhile, Sam and Topper slipped around the edge of the proscenium, coming out past the red velvet curtain. There were cheers and screams almost immediately: “Roger! Roger!” and “Show us your horns!”

Sam didn’t oblige, just looked out at the main floor of the club. He had never seen so many girls in his life. Girls in black formal-wear and fishnets, leather and lace, shiny patches of vinyl and acres of bare midriffs, with mime masks and dominos and occasional headbands with animal ears or maybe just joker ears sticking out beneath their hats. Top hats. Everywhere. And there were more girls and more than a few boys pouring in all the time, forming a sea of high silk hats on either side of the runway that led forward from the main stage, taking seats at the tables in the upper mezzanine, or swarming through the shadows of the upper balcony.

“Oh my God…” said Topper, stricken. “I haven’t seen this many possible suspects since the Democratic National Convention…”

Sam watched the bouncing, waving, shimmying sea of fans. “Well at least my brother and my friends have been lined out.” He glanced to her. “They have been lined out, right?”

“Sorry,” Topper admitted. “First rule of detective work-everyone’s a suspect until you solve the crime. Or the innocent mix-up. But if we don’t figure it out soon, it may become an unsolved mystery…” She looked out at the sea of top hats. “Can you spot our mystery woman?”

Sam looked. “No. I’d need opera glasses.” He glanced back to Topper. “Got any?”

“If I had my hat, that would not be a problem.” She smiled to the crowd and managed a feeble wave. “But if I had it, the point would be moot.” Topper’s smile looked like it had been affixed with a staplegun.

“We could ask Cameo,” Sam suggested. “If anyone has some, she would.”

“Cameo?” She looked glad for any excuse to look away from the audience. “The costumer for the band?”

“And the Jokertown Players. And Broadway. And the Jokertown High theatre department.” Sam held up his right glove and waggled his fingers, girls in the audience screaming in response. “Made me these. Even recommended Roger and the rest of the guys for the School for the Arts.” He waved again, eliciting more screams from frenzied girls, which was sort of fun now that he wasn’t in the middle of them, but only slightly. “She always has this bag of props. Seen her pull out everything from a feather boa to a frying pan.”

“Worth a shot,” Topper said. “But you ask. I don’t want anyone else to have even a chance of knowing what’s going on.”

“Sure thing.”

She pulled Sam back past the edge of the curtain and sighed, then looked at him. “You know what, Swash? The girls out there are right-you are cute. Way too young for me, but cute.” She gave a nervous grin. “Now let’s go see about those binoculars, Mr. Teen Idol.”

Sam felt a blush stealing into his face. “Sure thing.”

It took a bit of asking around backstage, but they finally located Cameo in the wardrobe room. “Got a sec?”

“No, but tell me what you need anyway.” She emerged from behind a rack of costumes, dressed as a twenties flapper in a fringed tea dress and cloche hat, her only departures from cutting the perfect IT girl figure being a tape measure in place of a string of pearls around her neck and the sudden expression of shock on her face as she stopped, gaping. Then the moment passed. “Sam! What have I told you?” She went over to him, clucking her tongue, clearly more distressed by the rips in his jacket than the scratches on his face. “Old clothes are like old people. You have to treat them gently.”

“Tell that to Roger’s fans.”

Cameo just shook her head. “You take that off before you do any more damage to it.” The cloche hat framed her face, beautiful as a nymph from a Mucha poster, a few spit-curls of golden hair pulled loose to make it a mirror of the face on the cameo she wore on a choker around her neck, her one constant amid her constantly shifting display of vintage outfits and recreations. “I’ll find you a loaner till I can fix it. Something black you can’t stain.”

Topper looked around at the racks of clothes and the stacks of hats, including a huge number of top hats, lingering for a moment on a collection of wigs, one long blond one in particular. “Nice collection,” she said, turning at last. “All this yours?”

“Heaven forfend,” Cameo said, “I do not have the space. Most of this is on loan from Dutton’s Theatrical Supply. We’re in rehearsals for The Boyfriend.” She turned to face a rack of tuxes and rifled through them. “Alec misplaced his cummerbund. I was hoping there might be one he could borrow.”

Topper stared at Cameo’s throat until she turned. “That’s a lovely brooch you have there. Antique?”

“Why yes,” Cameo said, her hand going to it. “Family heir-loom.” She dimpled. “And source of my nickname. My real name’s Ellen.”

“Melissa,” Topper said, her eyes flicking to Cameo’s golden spit-curls. “Were you at Starfields earlier?”

“Me?” said Cameo with a slightly alarmed expression. “You must be joking. I can’t stand eating in restaurants. The tables are never clean enough for me, and the silverware… Ugh! Just the idea of how many people have had it in their mouths…” She shuddered delicately. “Give me a nice new styrofoam box and disposable chopsticks any day.”

Sam nodded. “You’re talking to the Queen of Takeout here.”

“Too true,” Cameo sighed, going back to her search. “Call it an eccentricity, but until they invent a fashionable hazmat suit, the most I’ll be able to stand is the occasional stand-up buffet with plastic champagne glasses and cocktail pics.”

Topper gave her a long look. “Aren’t you an ace?”

Cameo chuckled. “If I say ‘yes,’ Marilyn Monroe’s lawyers will sue me. Word to the wise, but never accuse an international idol of card sharkery on national television. Especially if the only proof you can give is ‘revelations from the spirits.’”

“So you’re not an ace?”

“I’m a trance channeler and psychic-for entertainment purposes only-and do seances for the tourists over at the Dead Nicholas. I’m also a famous fraud.” Cameo chuckled. “Peregrine kicked me off her Perch and Hiram Worchester had me barred from Aces High once it came out that my only ace powers were my skills as an actress and the same medium scam that goes back to Houdini. And a positive blood test for the wild card.”

“Positive?” Topper asked.

Cameo nodded, then struck a melodramatic pose, her head cast back, her wrist to her forehead. “Alas, I’m cursed. I’m doomed. I live under a cloud of knowing that any day I might suddenly drop dead or suffer some unimaginable fate-which, if you think about it, sounds pretty much like a joker, not that you can convince many jokers of that,” she said, dropping the pose. “But since being a latent means always having to say your sorry, I decided to quit waiting for the damn card to turn and just picked something out of the deck myself.” She chuckled again. “After all, you don’t have to be a real psychic to go to a murder scene and scream about bad vibes. Besides,” she said, waving to her dress, “aces have an excuse to wear the coolest outfits. And people treat you like a celebrity. What’s not to like?”

Topper chuckled as well. “Do you want a list?”

Cameo paused. “You’re Topper, aren’t you? The conjurer ace?”

“Yes, I-” Topper broke off, spotting something hanging from the corner of one of the costume racks. “Excuse me, what’s that?” Sam looked-a white pantomime mask, a single tear on the cheek. The same as the fetish girl had been wearing back at Starfields.

Cameo glanced over to it. “Oh,” she said, then waved in dismissal, “that’s the mask for Pierrette.” She took Sam’s jacket and put it up on a hanger.

“Pierrette?”

“Poor Pierrette,’ actually,” Cameo said, looking through the tux rack as Topper went over to examine the mask. “Pierrot’s lover, from the comedia d’el arte. It’s one of the numbers in the show.” She pulled out a swallowtail coat. “Here, try this.”

Sam put his arms in the sleeves and shrugged it on. It was good fit, and black, but there wasn’t a sheath for his tail. “Um…” he said.

Cameo gave him a sharp look. “It’s Halloween in Jokertown, Sam. If you’ve got it, flaunt it. Except for that hat,” she said, removing it from his head. “This the handiwork of those crazed fangirls?”

Sam looked to Topper. “One of them.”

Topper glared while Cameo grimaced and said, “That kind of woman you do not need,” tsking over the ripped seam at the crown. “Now to find you a replacement…”

“Mind if I help?” Topper gestured to the tux rack and the top hats on top.

“Please do,” Cameo said. “We’re looking for something in a small.”

Topper got a step stool and began to inspect the hats, and Sam could tell she was not just checking their size.

Cameo set his battered hat aside on a work table, then picked up an overstuffed ragbag from the floor and set it next to it. “Let’s see what I’ve got in my bag of tricks. I’d rather not borrow from Dutton if I can help it…” She opened the bag and rifled through her assortment of costume pieces, pulling out another top hat, collapsed flat. She held it in her hands for a long while, contemplating it, then shook her head, and with an expert flick of her wrist, popped the top out into shape.

She turned, stopping and looked up at Topper where she was perched on the stool. “That’s a lovely hat you have there, Melissa,” she said at last. “Had it long?”

Topper looked at the one in her hands, then set it down and reached up and tapped the one on her head. “Why yes, actually. My grandfather gave it to me shortly before he died…”

“I’m… so sorry for your loss. Were you fond of him?”

It was kind of a forward question, even for Cameo, and Topper stopped search through the top shelf for a moment. Then continued. “Very. But it’s a mixed bag. My grandpa was a stage magician. Really great in his day, before the wild card. But it destroyed him.” She grabbed for another stack of top hats, popping them out and checking inside. “He used to work places like this, have bookings all over the country. Then… nothing.” She grimaced. “He was very bitter about it-I mean, who wants to see someone pull a rabbit out of a hat when in the next tent there’s a woman who can turn into a flying elephant?”

Cameo turned the hat over in her hands. “And then you drew an ace from that infernal deck…”

“I didn’t tell him,” Topper said, trying another hat. “Or anyone else for that matter. Not until after grandpa died.”

“He knew,” Cameo assured her. “Trust me, he knew. He just didn’t say anything.”

Topper cocked her head. “You really think so?”

“I know so. Grandfathers know these things.” Cameo gave a dark chuckle. “Besides, it’s hard to keep a secret from a professional magician.” Her mouth twisted in a wry grin as she contemplated the hat, turning it over again. “So what did you do after…” She paused, as if trying to come up with a delicate way to phrase it, then failing, “… your grandfather’s death? If you don’t mind me asking…”

“I’m a private eye. I’m used to questions.” Topper sighed and shrugged. “I went into government work. I didn’t want to be one of the aces who took the spotlight away from him. That, and the fact that I hate being on stage.” She grimaced. “I must be the only person who ever had the wild card turn from stage fright. Right in the middle of my high school talent show no less.”

“And your grandfather never told you that he knew…”

“If he did know.” Topper shook her head. “Trust him to die leaving me a mystery.”

“Or two.” Cameo chuckled. “The world needs mysteries now more than ever…” She laughed long and loud, as if she’d just heard the best joke in the world, then abruptly shook her head and stopped. “You know, Sam,” she said, turning the hat over in her hands, “I don’t think this hat will fit you after all.” She collapsed it, far less deftly than she’d popped it out, then turned and began to replace it in her ragbag.

“Are you sure?” Topper asked, coming down off the steps. “Could I see that one?”

Cameo paused, then shrugged and pulled the flattened top hat back out, flipping it to Topper like a Frisbee. Topper caught it and popped it out, turning it over in her hands and reaching inside to check the lining.

“You see,” Cameo said, coming over next to her and retrieving the hat, “this is a seven and a quarter, and we need more of a six and seven eighths or a seven.” She put the hat on Sam, demonstrating where it went down too low on his forehead, then collapsed it and put it back in her ragbag. Topper gave Sam a look he couldn’t read.

“Here,” Cameo said as she came back, “until I can fix the silk- if I can fix the silk-why don’t you just make do with ordinary felt?” She went to the rack where Topper had been searching and took down a modern top hat with rounded corners, checked the label, then put it on Sam’s head where it fit perfectly, if inelegantly.

“Socks?” Sam bent down and began unlacing his left boot. “And do you by any chance have any opera glasses or binoculars?”

“Are you on a scavenger hunt?” Cameo located a single clean sock, pointing him to a trash bin when he offered her the ink-soaked one. “No binoculars right now. Maybe a lorgnette?”

Topper shook her head lightly. “No, sorry,” Sam said.

“Ask Jim,” Cameo suggested, collecting her ragbag. “I need to go check the greenroom for cummerbunds. Alec isn’t someone you can just fit off the rack.”

She left and Topper came over as Sam finished tying his boot-laces. Sam laughed. “So, your talent show? Mine turned in detention.”

“What?”

Sam waggled his fingers. “My deuce. I was busted for graffiti. The VP tossed my artwork in the furnace.” He paused. “You know, mental cruelty to a latent is a firing offense…” He stood up and retrieved his sketchbook from the floor. “But hey, I survived, and so did you. Nothing wrong with that.”

“Yeah,” said Topper. “Is it me, or did she pull a Bobo Switch?”

“A what?” Sam asked.

“A Bobo Switch. It’s a magician’s pass that lets you swap one coin with another. You could do it with collapsed hats.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know,” Topper said. “I would have sworn that the top hat she just had there was mine. And she’s asking all these questions about my grandfather. Then next thing, she starts to put it away, then hands it back, and that’s the exact way a magician would swap one coin for another.” She gave him a sharp look. “Trust me, I may not be great at it anymore, but that was one of my tricks for the talent competition.”

Sam looked at her. “Again… why?”

Topper waved at the air. “I don’t know. I’m just making suppositions here. She’s the right height and build, and that mask there is awfully suspicious. And while her hair’s too short, it’s the right color, and it’s hard to tell length anyway with that hat, so maybe she has it pinned up. Or maybe she wore a wig-there’s plenty of them here.” Topper gestured to the room. “Plus that brooch of hers-that could have made a lump under the latex that would look like an Adam’s apple. And that weird crack about fashionable hazmat suits-what was Rubber Maid wearing if not that?”

“Or Bondage Babe could have been Mr. Dutton in drag,” Sam pointed out. “He’s thin too. He owns all these wigs and costumes, and he can certainly afford a pair of fake breasts.”

“Or that,” Topper conceded. “That’s the maddening thing about detective work. But was it just me, or was Cameo acting seriously weird?”

“Seriously weird? Remember, this is Jokertown, and you’re talking to a man who’s housemates with Jim. The guy’s almost twenty and still sends letters to Santa-which would just be pathetic, except Christmas morning, there’s extra presents under the tree and the milk and cookies are gone.” Sam let that sink in for effect. “Weird is relative. Cameo’s a theatre person. Weird, yes. Seriously, no. Or at least she always acts like that. We think she’s had one too many method acting classes.” Sam chuckled. “Roger got her drunk at a cast party and she did this hilarious crazed hunchback impression. You should have seen it.”

“Crazed hunchback?” Topper inquired, then shook her head and took a deep breath. “You’re right. I’m being paranoid. Let’s just go see if Jim has any binoculars then check the audience again. The show should start soon.”

They went downstairs and over to the stage where the guys were talking over the sound of an impatient audience coming through the curtain. “What do you think, Sam?” Alec asked. “Ditch the formals? ’Cause I’ve got this Green Knight outfit I was planning to wear for second set-I mean, it’s Halloween and all-and I can’t find the stupid cummerbund and we’re going to be on national TV. Plus the whole tux business makes me look like Lurch anyway.”

“Better than Tiny Tim,” Paul said, glaring. “If I hear ‘God bless us, everyone!’ one more time, I swear, I’m gonna whack someone.”

“‘Top Hat’ is our big number, that’s all I’m saying,” Roger pointed out, “and it’ll look pretty stupid to have four guys in formalwear plus the Rockettes dancing around a Ren Faire refugee. We close on ‘Top Hat’ at the break, then we change costumes, and then you can be the Jolly Green Giant all you want.”

“It’s not the Jolly Green Giant! It’s the Green Knight! From the tale of Sir Gawain.”

“Right, Alec. We all know about your Arthurian fixation. Even the wild card virus knows about your Arthurian fixation. Now lay off and tell us where you hid the cummerbund.”

“I didn’t hide the-Wait a sec,” he said, breaking off and looking down his very long nose at Topper. “Couldn’t you just pull my cummerbund out of your hat?”

Topper stared at him with a deer-in-headlights expression, then slowly shook her head. “Sorry. No requests. Firm rule of mine.”

“Can’t you break it?”

“Only if it’s life or death. Is a cummerbund that serious?”

“You ever been on stage?” Alec’s nostrils flared, making him look even more horse-faced. “With people calling you ‘Lurch’?”

Dirk looked up at Alec. “Hey dude, we could shave your head the rest of the way. Then you’d look like Uncle Fester instead.”

Alec glared down at him. “And if we dressed you in stripes, you’d look like Pugsley.”

“If Pugsley bleached his hair and did a whole ton of steroids,” Paul remarked.

“Shut up, Timmy,” Dirk told him. “It’s not my freakin’ fault I’ve got muscles like this.”

“Well,” said Jim, “if you use the Charles Atlas system for more than five days, what do you expect? You keep saying I’m crazy, but at least I followed the directions.” Jim stood there, cutting a perfect figure in his tux, then added, “But if the problem is Alec being too tall for the lineup, and we need a quick fix, what if we just made Paul taller instead? After all, it’s a lot easier to stretch someone who’s already stretchy, and his braces are fully adjustable.”

Paul waved a crutch. “You know how long it takes me to put these things on, let alone change the settings. We don’t have time.”

“Sure we do,” Jim said. “Look what I just got.”

You could have heard a pin drop at that moment. Jim’s Look what I just gots were usually followed by something spectacular and sometimes frightening, occasionally destructive. He held up his latest gimcrack, what looked like a remote control, with a few extra wires and sparkling diodes held on with strips of duct tape. “It’s a universal remote.” He displayed it with all the pride of a child showing off the new toy Santa had brought him. “The box said it would control all my appliances, electronics, entertainment and audiovisual equipment. I had to fiddle with it a bit before it worked right, but now it does, and doctor always calls Paul’s braces appliances. And look, here’s the vertical.” He pointed the remote at Paul and a jolt of electrical energy shot forth, connecting with the rubber boy’s braces and arcing along them like a Tesla coil.

Paul began to get taller and taller, rapidly nearing Alec’s height then going somewhat beyond, his body becoming correspondingly thinner, like a life-size Stretch Armstrong doll. “Gimcrack! Cut it out!” Paul’s leg braces were clearly visible beyond his highwater tux pants, getting higher still as electricity crackled and adjustment pins on the braces clicked and ratcheted spasmodically, inching higher and higher.

“Cut what out?” asked Jim.

“He means stop,” Roger said. “There’s a stop button, isn’t there, Jim?”

“Sure,” said the ace, “it’s right here.” Jim pressed the remote and the electrical charge zapped into nothingness, Paul’s braces locking just short of eight feet. His elongated midriff stuck out below his shirtwaist and above his tux pants, held up by his massively strained suspenders.

Topper leaned over to Sam and whispered in his ear, “On second thought, let’s not ask about the binoculars.” Sam nodded.

The rubber boy looked down at himself. “Hey, actually this is pretty cool.” He stilt-walked a couple steps towards Alec. “Hey look, Alec, I’m even taller than you!” He smiled then, the corners of his mouth curling up like a caricature. “I can even touch your horn…”

Paul reached his elongated arm for the forward point of Alec’s Mohawk and the tall joker jerked away. “Don’t you touch it, you fucking rubber chicken!” Alec reared back, his goatee flying. “I know you’re not a virgin!”

Paul grinned even more wickedly. “Hey, when you can beat all the other guys at Freakers annual ‘Whip it out’ contest, the girls can never get enough of you!”

“Really?” Jim looked perplexed again. “That hasn’t been my experience. I keep getting emails about how to ‘Add extra inches,’ and those work, of course, but there’s never any ‘Lose unwanted inches’ programs, at least for your penis.”

There was another of those pin-drop silences. “Jim,” Roger said, shaking his head, “please, whatever you do, don’t mention that once the curtain goes up. And Alec, Paul-that goes double for you two. You should know better. This is our first live broadcast and we don’t want to piss off the network.”

“The Network?” Jim repeated. “The celestial intelligences I hear with my pyramid hat?”

“Well ‘celestial intelligences’ may be going a bit far, but they’re the ones who cut the checks,” said a woman’s voice from behind Sam. “Remember, we’re talking Mtv here.”

Sam turned, seeing a tall brunette in a gold dress with more sequins than the Sultan of Brunei, her hair elaborately coiffed up with pins tipped with gold coins with a matching necklace and drop pendant earrings, and a pair of beautiful brown-and-white-feathered wings behind her. And equally spectacular cleavage in front. Peregrine, the flying ace model and talk show hostess.

She swept forward, regal as the Queen of Angels, which was probably the general idea. “I hope you boys excuse the liberty. I was wanting to talk with you about a possible appearance on my Perch, and Chaos invited us backstage.” She waved behind herself, then partially unfurled her left wing, to both shelter and backdrop two other individuals. “I also wanted to introduce my son, John Fortune. He’s a great fan of yours. And this is his date…” She glanced back.

“Velvet,” supplied the girl, “Velvet Brown.”

If it was possible to eclipse Peregrine, this girl did. Posed against the feathered curtain, which made her even more radiant, was a startlingly beautiful young woman, no more than sixteen, gorgeous as a Hollywood starlet of another era, with long dark curls, flawless ivory skin, and intense violet eyes. She was dressed in a velvet riding habit, circa 1940s, and a pert little top hat, and had one slim hand laid on the arm of a young man about the same age. This lucky boy was as gorgeous as his mother and almost as tall, with the extra perk of being genuinely exotic, at least on the nat end of the scheme, with café-au-lait skin, kinky hair the color of burnished gold, and huge almond-shaped brown eyes. This didn’t exactly fit with the round black glasses or the purple scar makeup in the shape of a lightning bolt at the edge of his hairline, but having a mother who could actually help you fly was probably consolation for a less-than-convincing Harry Potter costume.

“Wow!” said John. “This is so cool, I can hardly believe it! You guys are really all jokers?”

“Well I’m not,” Jim admitted. “I’m only a latent.” He said this, as always, with a straight face, though this time while holding a universal remote wrapped with duct tape and diodes and arcing with weird electrical energy.

John Fortune looked askance at it, as did Velvet Brown and Peregrine. “There’s so much shoddy workmanship these days,” Jim apologized further, “but then I guess you get what you pay for.” He waved it, making it spark and causing Paul to grow an inch. “I picked this up off the bargain table at the five and dime, so I really shouldn’t complain.”

Alec put his finger next to his ear and twirled it in the universal crazy signal, then looked away and pretended he was primping his Mohawk the moment Jim glanced back.

“I’m a latent too,” said John, smiling the trying-to-make-conversation-with-the-nice-crazy-person smile.

Jim smiled back. “My sympathies.”

“Perhaps you might make your friend a bit shorter, dear?” Peregrine interrupted gently. “Say, six-three, six-four? A little more in the shoulders, a little less in the hips, the Fabio proportions?”

“Okay…” Jim pressed a couple buttons, causing the static to arc, and Paul began to get shorter and slightly wider, at least across the shoulders, while Jim looked back to John. “Roger was a latent until a little while ago, but he was lucky enough to draw a joker-deuce, and he’s working on making it into an ace.”

“As should we all,” said Peregrine. “Being an ace is an attitude. Though a good fashion designer helps.” Sam realized then that she wasn’t got up as the Queen of Angels but the Queen of Pentacles, wearing what had to be a Bob Mackie original.

Jim began to look distraught, then showed the remote to Peregrine. “I checked all the buttons, but there isn’t a hip-narrowing function…”

Peregrine smiled. “Oh yes there is. I was in more than enough beauty pageants when I was younger.” She furled her wings and moved closer, checking out Paul’s butt, now that he’d reached a more reasonable height. “Do you have any athletic tape?”

“No,” said Jim, then produced a silver roll from the pocket of his tux, “but I have duct tape.”

Paul’s eyes almost popped out of his head, literally. “You’re not going to duct tape my ass!”

Peregrine’s wings rustled softly as she laid a perfectly manicured hand on his shoulder, her nails as gold as her lipstick. “Trust me, dear-there are no jokers, only aces with bad publicists and fashion designers.”

“Yeah, all Bloat needed was a muumuu…”

Peregrine only smiled. “And a press kit. This is showbiz. We’re selling a fantasy.” She cast a glance around, then locked eyes with Topper standing next to Sam. “Melissa! My goodness, I didn’t even notice you! What are you doing here?” She smiled her most dazzling smile, an advertisement for the virtues of toothbonding and cosmetic dentistry. “I know you have athletic tape in that hat of yours. Could we trouble you for some?”

“Uh…” said Topper, and Sam realized that the world’s chattiest ace talk show hostess was the last person that Topper wanted to know that she’d lost her magic conjuring hat.

“Good luck,” said Alec. “She won’t even give me my cummerbund.”

“Which I just found,” said Cameo, appearing from behind Dirk. “It was behind the couch in the greenroom.”

“Cameo!” Peregrine exclaimed. “So lovely to see you.”

“Say it on camera and I’ll believe it, Peri,” she replied, taking a moment to adjust her hat. As she brushed by Peregrine, there was a sudden loud *ZOT* and a flash of electricity and ozone, and the only thing Sam could figure was that the beads on Cameo’s flapper dress had somehow acted as a conductor and allowed the static electricity from Jim’s remote control and Paulie’s braces to arc to Peregrine’s copious amounts of metal jewelry. Her hair went up like the Bride of Frankenstein and her wings spreadeagled on reflex, the feathers whacking the front edge on Alec’s Mohawk, and the spiraled ivory horn.

Alec screamed and the scream turned into a whinny as his face elongated, becoming more horselike, and his body became more staglike, and his legs became more goatlike, and his tuxedo split apart, revealing a lion’s tail, very much like the one Sam possessed, except in white, with an elaborate tassel at the tip, like the one possessed by a heraldic lion-or a unicorn, which was what Alec had become. Only his spiraled horn, Mohawked mane, long white goatee and mass remained constant between forms. He waved his cloven hooves, pawing the air as the remnants of the tuxedo fell to the stage, then he came down hard on them, looking at Peregrine with fire in his eye, an accusatory snort, and his horn pointed straight at her heart.

Lenore was squawking and screaming and trying to become airborne while the static in Peregrine’s hairdo collapsed, and she stood there, a wisp of smoke coming from the underwires of her support bra. “What happened?”

“You’re not a virgin!” Jim exclaimed.

“What?” said Peregrine, dazed. “Of course I’m not a virgin-I’m a mother! How many mothers are virgins?” She blinked, starting to focus on the unicorn in the top hat in front of her.

“Alec shifts if anyone who’s not a virgin touches the tip of his horn,” Jim explained. “He can only change back if he has a virgin ride him.”

“What sort of ‘ride’?” asked Topper.

“A short one. Five, ten minutes, tops.” Jim paused and bit his lip. “As for virgin mothers, there’s Sister Mary Immaculate over at Our Lady of Perpetual Misery. She’s given birth the last seven Christmases in a row, and she’s the one we get to ride Alec if there aren’t any other virgins handy.”

Velvet Brown put up her hand. “So any girl who’s never had sex with a man counts?”

“I think so,” said Jim. “Lesbians can still be virgins, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

Velvet smiled her starlet smile, then threw her arms around Alec’s neck and announced, in the worst British accent Sam had ever heard, “Pie’s the best horse! I’m going to ride him in the Grand Nationals!” With this, she planted a kiss right at the base of Alec’s horn and swung herself up on his back, posing as if she were ready for her closeup.

Alicorn the unicorn’s eyes went wide and then he screamed, rearing up, champing the air, Velvet Brown clinging frantically to his mane as he shook his head till the ridiculous top hat flew free.

“I don’t think she’s a virgin,” Jim said. “Alec gets very upset if someone who’s not a virgin gets-” Jim broke off abruptly as Alicorn’s hoof lashed out and knocked the universal remote from his hand, sending it spinning and skittering across the stage, weird energy arcing in all directions, grounding itself into every bit of metal in sight, then some beyond it as the curtain began to rise, the ropes of the gaffing system beginning to pull it up via electronic pulley.

“What’s happening?” Peregrine demanded.

“My remote!” Jim screamed. “He smashed it! And I think he hit play!”

On cue, the bands’ instruments behind them, everything from Dirk’s drumsticks to Roger’s electric fiddle, rose up into position, borne aloft by strands of phantom energy, and started into the opening strains of Irving Berlin’s ‘Top Hat.’ Then a gap open in the curtain as the drapery swags parted and the unicorn made for it, still screaming, running out onto the runway spit accompanied by the screams of Velvet Brown mixed with those of countless other girls.

A camera operator ran in, wearing headphones and a mike. “Peri! The cameras are acting like they’re possessed, but that doesn’t matter-we’ve somehow got a live network feed! We’re live! We’re live!”

“It’s all audiovisual and entertainment…” Jim said plaintively. “Did you say The Network?”

Peregrine and Roger exchanged looks, then, with the instincts of veteran showpeople, they turned to the wings and called, “Cue the Rockettes!”

Peregrine then took the cameraman’s headset and stepped forward, into the breech, announcing, “Ladies and gentlemen, live from the new, and aptly named, Club Chaos, Mtv is proud to present a special Halloween show- New York ’s new hometown favorite, The Jokertown Boys!”

Sam balked-Alec had become hoarse all right. Or horse. Or unicorn, as was the case, and he had the choice of joining the band as replacement singer or chasing after his friend. It was an easy choice, and not just because of the rattle of tap shoes behind him or the screams and wild applause as the unicorn ran the length of the runway, Topper running after him and Velvet Brown screaming, “Jerry, you idiot!” as they vaulted into the aisle. Sam followed, National Velvet Jerry or whoever she was still astride Alicorn’s back as the unicorn ran into the lobby, out the main doors, and up the street, vaulting cabs.

Somewhere in the lobby, Sam realized that John Fortune was with them, in fact outpacing Topper, quidditch robes far better suited to running than stiletto heels, and they all caught up with Velvet Brown just as she was dumped on her ass in the middle of the roadway, Alicorn continuing up the street without her.

“That was wicked cool!” John exclaimed, while Topper and Sam couldn’t do much more than pant.

A moment later, Peregrine landed next to them. “John Fortune!” she exclaimed, using all her stage presence and the fury of mothers everywhere. “What on earth do you think you’re doing running off like that?”

John pointed to his date, who Sam suddenly realized was a dead ringer for long dead movie starlet, Elizabeth Taylor. “You said I was supposed to stick with my bodyguard, mom.”

“That is not your bodyguard,” Peregrine intoned with barely controlled rage. “That is someone who is so fired she’d think J.J. Flash had done it.”

The girl went pale. “And our Agency?”

Peregrine paused. “Has proven itself on other occasions,” she conceded, looking to Topper. “Melissa, are you free?”

“’Fraid not. I’m on another case.”

Peregrine looked sour at this, but didn’t bother to plead or argue, merely took her son by the shoulders and said, “Young man-I will, of course, be furious if the answer is no, but I need an honest answer to a simple question: Are you a virgin?”

John Fortune’s eyes went wide behind the Harry Potter glasses and he nodded. “Yes ma’am.”

“Good,” said Peregrine, “then you get to ride a unicorn. Assuming…” She looked askance to Sam and Topper.

Sam nodded. “Male virgins count.” He pointed up the street. “He went that way.”

“Good,” said Peregrine, gathering John Fortune into her arms and winging off down the block.

Jerry-Velvet-Elizabeth got up and dusted herself off, looking after the rapidly disappearing Peregrine, then simply shrugged and walked over to them. “Back to the club?”

“For us. You got fired, remember?” Topper took a couple steps in that direction then stopped, the girl still following. “Yes, Jerry?”

“What sort of case are you on?”

“Um…” Topper looked stricken, and Sam realized that, the same as Peregrine, Jerry was also someone who under no circumstances could know that Topper had lost her hat.

“Actually, she’s not on a case,” Sam said, taking Topper’s hand. “We’re on a date.”

“Yes, a date.” Topper hugged close to him, putting her head on his shoulder for a moment.

The fallen starlet looked at Topper, then Sam, then back. “I thought you said you didn’t go for younger men.”

“No,” said Topper, “that’s just something I told Pete. I don’t date guys who habitually insult people and smoke huge cigars as over-compensation. But I was trying to be polite.” She looked to the faux Elizabeth Taylor, then Sam, then pulled him into a kiss, full on French, no holds barred.

By the time it was over, Sam felt almost as dazed as Peregrine had been after the jolt. “See?” Topper said. “Date.” She led Sam a few step back towards the club. “And if you tell Pete about any of this, I’ll tell him about you and the dalmatians.”

“What dalmatians?”

“You know Pete,” Topper said. “I don’t need to tell him any more than that.” She paused. “Maybe a number. A hundred. A hundred and one. He already knows you have a thing for Glenn Close.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Try me, Cruella.”

They continued back towards Club Chaos, Jerry-Velvet-Elizabeth tagging along like a kid sister. “Oh well,” the girl said, “even if you’re not on a case, there’s still one mystery left.” Topper looked askance at her until finally the girl let it out: “Do you think Cameo zapped Perry?”

“That’s your mystery?” Topper looked exasperated. “Cameo? We both saw the sparks from Gimcrack’s gizmo.”

“Yeah, but that would give her the perfect cover.”

Topper snorted. “But why? And with what?”

“Her ace,” said the starlet.

“Ace? Jerry, she’s a famous fraud.” Topper bit her lip. “Even if she isn’t, she’s what, a spirit medium? I didn’t see any seance tables. What could she do, zap Perry with ectoplasm?”

“No,” said Jerry, “with a dead ace’s ace.”

Topper balked, bringing her and Sam to a dead stop. “Come again?”

“I went on a mission with her once,” Jerry explained. “Secret government stuff. Very hush-hush. Billy Ray was there. You used to work with him. He tell you?”

“We’re talking Billy,” Topper said. “No.”

Jerry looked smug. “Cameo’s ace lets her channel the dead by touching something they had in life. Something important to them. Like your hat, Melissa. If you were dead, I mean. And if the dead person was an ace, she can channel their powers too.” Jerry looked at Topper’s topper. “Actually, that hat would be a real score for her. Cameo’s payment for the mission was going to be Black Eagle’s jacket, but if she had your hat, she could pull out that, Brain Trust’s pearls, Cyclone’s flight helmet-hell, whatever she wants.”

“If I were dead,” Topper amended.

“Yeah.”

“And this shocking ace?”

“Dunno,” Jerry said, “Cameo had all this junk in her backpack. Said she could summon a shocker with some hat. Never saw it, I… left the mission early.”

Topper squeezed Sam’s hand, and he squeezed back, and they walked a long while in silence before Topper said, “So you planning to out her? For putting her ace back up her sleeve, I mean, after Peri and everyone laughed at it?”

“Well, maybe Peri…”

“Would laugh at you too,” Topper finished. “Face it, Jerry-Cameo may have the perfect motive, but she’s also got a perfect alibi. And even if she confessed, Peri wouldn’t believe her.” She paused. “And in the scheme of ace pranks, zapping someone’s butt is pretty trivial. You’d out someone for that? You, of all people?”

“It was probably Jim’s remote anyway,” Sam said.

Jerry paused. ““This sort of thing happens?”

“Since we were kids. You should have seen it when he took drivers ed. The car was an automatic.”

“You know, Jerry,” Topper said, “you could still catch a movie…”

“Hmm… the Metreon is showing all the Hammer Draculas. Including Brides.” The starlet looked pensive. “Those girls in the nightgowns are really hot…”

“And they’re waiting for you,” Topper said. “Look, there’s a cab.”

Jerry looked, then ran for it, waving.

“She’s bisexual, right?” Sam asked. “’Cause regular lesbians don’t set Alec-”

“Jerry’s a special case,” Topper said, shutting him off, “and yes, our agency is a detective agency.”

“Isn’t she a bit young?”

“You’re not one to talk, young man.” Topper squeezed his hand. “But you should see Pete. Not that that matters right now since we know-”

There was a flutter of feathers and gold sequins as Peregrine alighted. “You’re needed on stage, Sam.”

“But-”

“But nothing. You’re the best thing to happen to jokers rights in ten years.” She scooped him up in both arms and Sam and his sketchbook were pressed against the famous cleavage as the flying ace took off, speaking into her headset, “Got him. Cue the Boys for our entrance.” They swept up into the air, then down, and Sam felt his stomach lurch as Peregrine folded her wings in a power dive, fanning them out as they entered the lobby, then folding them again as they plunged through the doors into the main theatre, swooping over the heads of audience. The crowd went wild, with cheers and screams, and Roger’s voice boomed, “LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, MY BROTHER, SAM-OUR ACE COVER ARTIST, SWASH!”

Peregrine landed with him and Roger pressed a microphone into his hands. “Jokertown Blues, Sam. C.C.’s version-your lead.”

Sam felt his mouth go dry, but Dirk pressed a bottle of water into his hand and Sam took a swig, realizing that the drummer’s presence meant that Jim’s mad ace was somehow still playing the instruments. He hoped it could take a cue: “And a One-Two-Three!

If you go down to Jokertown

Anyone you might see

Might be a little old lady

Name of Juju Marie

She might look like you

She might look like me

But there’s mighty mean momma

Name of Juju Marie

The radios had played that fourteen years ago, C.C. Ryder’s version of the old Mr. Rainbow song, when Sam and Roger’s parents had taken them to Jokertown for the day. And while they hadn’t met the old blues witch, they’d run into her counterpart, Typhoid Croyd, their parents dying, Sam and Roger going to the J-town orphanage.

If you go down to Jokertown

Better watch what you say

Or that little old lady’s

Gonna blow you away

“Toads and Diamonds,”

That’s what she sings,

“Jokers, and Aces,

And Black Queens and Kings”

Sam put his heart into that verse. ‘Kings’ was J-town slang for latents, shorthand for ‘suicide kings,’ the sword of Damocles of the wild card suspended over every latent’s head until it finally dropped, usually ending in death, sometimes maiming even worse than death.

He’d been a latent for eleven years and a deuce for only three. He knew what it felt like.

If you go down to Jokertown

You better pray hard

That a little old lady

Don’t deal you a card

You might start to weep

You might start to wail

You might feel an urge

To start a-shaking your tail!

Sam did so, flaunting the thing that set him apart from human, the joker that he could have but would never have removed. The audience went wild, girls screaming, snatching and grabbing for it as he danced out of the way.

Then his lion’s tail wasn’t the only one on stage. Alicorn leapt onto the end of the runway, John Fortune dismounting, and the unicorn began slowly walking along the ramp to the adulation of the virgins and somewhat less virginal teenyboppers on both sides as the rest of the Boys joined in on the next verse:

If you go down to Jokertown

Well, you might just stay there

’Cause that mean ol’ woman

Who deal cards, she ain’t fair

If you lose, you win

If you win, you lose

What I’m talking about

Is called the Wild Card Bluuuuuuues…

On the long sustained note, the unicorn reached the end of the runway and reared up on his hind legs, morphing from Alicorn into Alec-Alec, totally naked-and Sam realized that when he’d catalogued his friend’s changes earlier, he’d been inaccurate. Aside from his horn, mane, and mass, Alec’s unmentionables remained relatively unaffected by the transformation: He was hung like a horse in either form. Girls screamed in appreciation while the Boys got in front of him, strategically placing Dirk’s shoulders between the cameras and Alec, handing him a microphone for the encore:

You’ll get no release!

You’ll get no reprieve!

And if you go down to Jokertown

You might never leave!

The crowd went wild while various individuals attempted to enforce decency standards: cameramen battling to restrain possessed and prurient audiovisual equipment, Jim puzzling over his smashed remote, and Cameo running from offstage carrying a giant green tunic which she threw to Alec. Just as he put it on over his horn and got it low enough for at least regimental standards of decency, the weird electrical energy evaporated into nothingness and the instruments clattered to the stage. As the curtain began to come down, Jim triumphantly held up the universal remote in one hand and the batteries in the other.

“That was fun,” the crazy ace said, turning to the rest of them. “Do you think we’ll be able to top that with the next set?”

“God I hope not…” Alec prayed. “I must have looked like Herne out there.”

Jim nodded. “A lot like he did in ‘The King of Spring.’”

“Jim,” Paul said, “that’s not a good thing. That’s a joker porn video.”

“It is not,” Jim insisted. “I read the box. It’s a French art film.”

“Where Herne fucks twenty nuns.”

“It’s symbolic. He’s the King of Spring.”

Dirk snorted. “King of Sproing is more like it.”

“You’re not being helpful,” Cameo said, then to Alec, “Honestly, Alec, you do not look like Herne.”

“ Herne has antlers,” Jim said helpfully, “you have a unicorn horn. No one could mistake you. Above the waist, at least.”

Alec groaned while Cameo said, “Let’s just get you your tights.”

The went offstage to the changing area where the most noticeable thing was Cameo’s ragbag spilled across the floor. The next most noticeable thing was when Topper snatched the cloche hat off Cameo’s head. “Alright,” she said, stuffing it inside the inverted top hat she held in her other hand, “and for my next trick, I’d like to hear some serious answers. That is, if you ever want to see your own precious hat again.”

Cameo turned and began to glow blue with St. Elmo’s fire, electricity sparking off the bobbypins of her bizarre hairdo, which consisted of her long honey blond tresses pinned up and over a battered fedora, squashed from where it had been hidden beneath the cloche. “I don’t know who you are, lady,” she growled, “but you stay away from Ellen or you’ll have to answer to me.”

“And who are you?” Topper asked, stepping back, her hand still down her hat.

“That, I expect, would be Nick Williams,” said Peregrine, stepping in front of John Fortune, “a dead private investigator. And a dead ace. Will-o’-the-Wisp, the Hollywood phantom.”

“Who-” said Cameo, turning, then, “Oh, the winged bimbo who called me a liar. Ellen too.” A small ball of energy had formed in the air, levitating above her right hand like an ignis fatuous. “Going to call us liars again?”

Peregrine stood there, her face a mask of regal calm. “No. Though you were less than forthcoming with all the particulars of your story.”

“I told you everything,” Cameo said. “I was an ace up the sleeve, and I was murdered for it. Only thing I didn’t tell you was that when Ellen calls me back, she calls my ace too.”

“Is that why you stole my hat?” Topper asked.

“What?” said Cameo, then looked distracted, as if she were listening to someone. “Ellen says she didn’t steal your hat, she stole your grandfather’s hat. She needed to talk with him.” Cameo looked distracted again. “Says he’s a stubborn old bastard, and he’s pissed as hell that you kept your ace up your sleeve. But tit for tat. You never told him your secret, he never told you his.”

Topper’s eyes went wide. “That’s what this is about? Grandpa’s tricks?”

The electrical charge faded back into Cameo and she shook her head. “Yes,” she said, “I’m sorry for borrowing your hat, but you can use any hat for your tricks, while I needed this one in particular.”

Topper looked to Sam, then back to Cameo. “You read that same damned Aces! article, didn’t you?”

“Actually, I did,” said Roger. “I won’t let Cameo take the rap for it alone. I put her up to it. The article said that after the fire, the only personal effects Blackwood the Magnificent had left were his hat-”

“And the International Brotherhood of Magicians pocket watch he was buried with,” Topper finished for him. “And you didn’t want to desecrate his grave. I guess I should thank you for that.” She paused then and grimaced. “Grandpa forgive me… hopefully soon…” She reached deep into her hat and came back with a corroded silver pocket watch, covered with dust and gravemold. She tossed it to Cameo.

The medium caught it in one hand, then gazed at it for a long moment. Then she popped the catch and looked at the watchface, remarking, “This is going to need to be cleaned if you expect me to be wearing it.” She looked up then, smiling. “Melissa. How are you, my dear?”

“Grandpa?” Topper asked.

“The same,” she said, “or different. Don’t be so amazed. Swapping places with an assistant is old hat.” She chuckled. “Besides which, if Houdini managed an escape from the grave, why should you be surprised when I play the same trick?”

“This afternoon… you didn’t tell me it was you.”

“You didn’t ask. Besides which, it wasn’t my trick to reveal.” Cameo raised her eyebrows. “Anything you’d like to tell me now, my dear?”

Topper bit her lip, then let it out all in one breath: “I’m an ace, grandpa.”

The medium nodded. “There, that wasn’t so hard. I’m glad to hear it. But as I can see from the faces here, that secret has been spread rather thin. Indeed, I heard you tell it this afternoon to one who you believed was a complete stranger. Not quite worth the price of the Blackwood legacy.” She looked about the group. “Are there any other takers?” She looked to Roger. “You, sir, the gentleman with the handsome raven-I’m informed you quest after magic. Is this so?”

“Of course,” said Roger. “You’re one of my idols.”

“A flattering thing to hear in a weary world,” Cameo responded, “but flattery is cheap, and you know my price: A secret for a secret. But a bit of professional advice: A good magician has more than one trusted assistant. If you can take those present here into your confidence, I suggest you do so.”

Roger looked around, lingering a long moment on Peregrine and her son, but she nodded as did he. “Alright,” Roger said, “I’m not an ace. Not even a deuce. All my tricks are parlor magic.”

“Anything else?”

Roger paused, then took a deep breath. “I’m not a joker either.” He reached up and lifted his eyepatch, then opened his eye and pinched out a large black lens. “Theatrical contacts.”

“But you have horns!” Jim protested. “I’ve seen them!”

“Those are real,” Roger said, “just not mine. I got them from Hodge-Podge.”

“Hodge-Podge?” Peregrine asked.

“Back alley psychic surgeon,” Roger explained. “She takes bits off animals and put them on people.” Roger replaced his contact and eyepatch, then lifted his hat. “Somewhere there’s a small African antelope missing its horns.”

Everyone looked at Sam’s tail until he tucked it between his legs. “Uh… guys, this is original equipment.”

“Same here,” said Alec.

“Not here.” Roger dropped his hat. “I’m a latent. That’s all.”

“No,” said Cameo, “you are also a skilled illusionist. I can see from the faces here.” She gazed about the circle. “I also find this very droll-an ace pretending to be a latent aiding a latent pretending to an ace.” She glanced over to Topper. “And teaching my granddaughter a valuable lesson in the bargain: A good magician never relies too heavily on one trick. Enjoy your hat, Melissa. And adieu, for the moment.”

Cameo clicked the watch shut and shook her head. “He’s gone.”

“May I have his watch back?”

Cameo paused, then pressed the stud again, raising a cloud of dust, and fixed Topper with haughty look. “Really, Melissa. It’s my watch, and last I checked, the dearly departed were allowed to take their grave goods into the afterlife however they please. This is how I please. Once Ellen assists with costume changes, we intend to watch the performance-and my new apprentice.”

“I thought I was your apprentice.”

“You were, my dear,” Cameo said softly, “but there’s a difference between something you do to please your grandfather, and something you do out of love for the art. And despite my current state, I still have standards. This young man meets them. Masquerading one magic as another, well, that has a certain flair, don’t you think? You are all assistants in a grand illusion, one final Blackwood trick.” She paused, listening. “And Ellen tells me that it is time for a certain young man to get into his tights. It appears the theatre has not changed much in the years since my death, and I take some comfort in that, so again, adieu for now.” Cameo clicked the watch shut again and said to Topper, “My hat?”

Topper pulled the cloche out of her topper and tossed it to Cameo, and as she and the Boys set about costume changes, Topper came over next to Sam and sighed. “Trust grandpa to upstage me, even after all these years.”

“Trust my brother to join him,” Sam said.

“They’re two of a kind, aren’t they?”

“Seems like. Anything for the show. Your grandpa ever drag you onstage?”

“When I was five…” Topper bit her lip. “You know, I was planning to go to a costume party at Aces High. Care to blow this popstand and join me?” She paused. “What’s wrong?”

“That phrase.” Sam nodded to where Cameo was helping Jim with a Dr. Frankenstein costume. “Do you know how many sodas have names like ‘Burst’ and ‘Blast’? Jim blew up the 7-11 once.” Sam switched his tail then. “Do I meet the dress code?”

“You’ve just had thousands of girls screaming for you. Hiram’s a snob, not an idiot. And it’s a charity masquerade anyway.” She paused. “The only problem is that I only bought one ticket and it’s sold out. And while Hiram keeps extras in his desk,” With a flourish, she produced a sheaf from her hat, “they require his signature to be valid…”

“What’s the charity?”

“J-town Clinic, same as always,” Topper said, handing him the passes. “I can slip a few thousand in the till when he’s not looking.”

Sam grinned, laying them out on the cover of his sketchbook. “Got an example?” he asked, pulling off his glove.

Topper produced one, and with a flair, Sam forged both Hiram Worchester’s flamboyant up-and-down signature and his peacock blue fountain pen ink. “Cast party is on me,” said Topper, taking the extras and handing them to Peregrine, “but tell the Boys that I’ve absconded with their backup singer.” She replaced her hat, tapped the top, and extended her arm to Sam. “Care to join your fellow aces?”

Sam accepted her arm. “Sure thing.”