Maps of Hell

One

I woke up in panic and felt pain all over my body-arms, gut, ribs, groin. I took a deep breath and turned onto my back. The searing light made me jam my eyes shut. Holding my hand in front of my face, I sat up slowly, finding it hard to balance, and looked at myself. I was naked and filthy, white skin rubbed raw in places from the rough blanket I’d been lying on. Suddenly I felt dizzy and pitched forward onto the cold floor. A rush of vomit surprised me, jerking from my mouth in successive surges. I felt like shit.

Then I realized something worse. I didn’t know who I was. I had no memory. I had no past. I was no one.

I clenched my fists and tried to get a grip. Where was I? I looked around the room. It was only a little longer than the concrete platform I had been lying on, and not much more than twice as wide. One of the narrow ends was taken up by a metal door, and there wasn’t a window in any of the other three walls. A long fluorescent light divided the ceiling, while the floor was concrete. I had no recollection of coming to the place. I had no idea, even, of what part of the world I was in.

I blinked and took in the room again. It was making my head swim. The platform was at a weird angle to the floor and it was wider at one end than the other. The walls, ceiling and floor had all been painted in the same dull gray color, so it was hard to see where one ended and the next began.

I realized I was sweating heavily. The place was roasting hot, even though there was no sign of a heat source. The stench of my vomit was making me gag. I wiped the floor with my blanket, then threw it into the corner. My throat was parched and I searched in vain for a tap or bottle. Apart from me and the stinking blanket, the room was completely empty.

I wondered how long I had been there. I had lost all sense of time and couldn’t say whether it had been minutes or hours since I’d woken. I went to the door and put an ear to it. I couldn’t hear anything. I seemed to be completely alone. My empty stomach contracted and I clamped my arms around my raised knees. Had I been left to rot in this hole?

At least my mind was working. I was able to think, but that only made me feel more bereft. I yelled and listened for a response. There was none. I felt my eyes dampen. I could think and I could speak, but I knew as little as a tiny child. Someone had stolen my identity, my very soul. I had never wanted to see another human face so much. But no one came.

I inspected my body. There were yellow and black bruises on my arms and abdomen, and lumps of dried blood on my knuckles. I looked closer. Puncture marks dotted the skin on the inside of my upper and lower arms. I ran my fingers across my face. The stubble was thick. My hair was short. I pulled some out and saw a mixture of black and white. I felt scabs on my forehead. There was nothing in the room that showed my reflection. I went to the door and banged my hands on it. There was a narrow space between the bottom of the door and the floor. I dropped to my knees and lowered my head, but could see nothing, not even a trace of light. I stood up again on unsteady legs, my eyes getting damp again as I realized I had no idea what I looked like.

I started to mumble, trying to find comforting words, words that would help me find out who I was. I took in my shrunken genitals. Man. I was a man. Muscles. My arms and legs hardened when I tensed them-I was in reasonable shape. I was thirsty, hungry. My throat hurt and my stomach rumbled. I stretched out on the floor, closed my eyes and tried to empty my mind of the here and now. Think. Remember. Who was I? Where did I come from? Who did I know?

For a time nothing happened. Then a name appeared unprompted in my consciousness.

Washington.

What did that mean?

I was suddenly aware of a dim figure, a man in a wig and a military jacket. Washington.

Wooden teeth.

What the hell?

Then, as if curtains had parted, my mind regained its visual function and I saw a wide, grass-covered open space with a tall, domed building in the distance. I seemed to know that the place was called Washington, but I had no idea where it was or what it meant to me. I was sure I had been there, though: the picture was too vivid to have come from a film or a book.

I said the word aloud, breaking it into syllables.

“Wash-ing-ton…”

…I am in a car driven by an impassive man in a dark suit. On the backseat beside me is a blonde woman, whose name I don’t know. She seems to know me. She squeezes my arm as we pass, on our left, a white house with a colonnaded porch. She seems to treat it with exaggerated respect, as does the driver. The sun has almost set and its rays are casting a soft red light over the buildings. I’m in very good spirits.

“Hey, didn’t you say you could take us wherever we wanted?” I say to the short-haired man at the wheel.

He glances at me in the mirror. “That is so, sir. But I suggest we go to your hotel so you can freshen up first.”

I look at the woman by my side and laugh. “Oh, we’re fresh enough. Why don’t you take us to one of those rough places? I want to see the real Washington.”

My companion shakes her head and leans forward. “Don’t listen to him. He likes to think he’s an expert on crime.”

I laugh again. “And you’re not? Come on, let’s live dangerously. Let’s go to Anacostia. That’s where the drug dealers are in charge, isn’t it?”

The driver nods. “Yeah, it’s one of the places that’s theirs. I really don’t think-”

“Don’t worry, we’ll take full responsibility,” I say, getting a frown from the woman. “Anyway, you’ve got a radio to call for help, haven’t you?”

He twitches his head but then does as I say, turning to the right and crossing a bridge shortly afterward. The buildings change from stone to clapboard, and there are young black men on every street corner. They give the large car glances that combine interest with disdain.

“Seen enough?” the driver asks, after a few minutes.

“No,” I say. “We want to get out and take the air.”

“Speak for yourself,” my companion says in a low voice.

I smile and kiss her on the lips. “Stop at the next junction,” I tell the chauffeur.

“I really don’t recommend this, sir,” he says, but he complies.

“Coming?” I ask, as I open the door.

“Oh, all right,” the woman says. “Idiot.” She slides awkwardly across the seat and takes my hand. I feel her weight.

I lean down before I close the door. “Turn right and wait for us.”

The driver gives me a disapproving look and then drives on.

We’re on our own. For under a minute. The first boy-he couldn’t have been over twelve-turns his bicycle toward us, pedals hard and then stops a finger-length from me.

“Watcha got in the bag, lady?” he asks with a wide smile, but I notice his eyes have narrowed.

My companion holds her shoulder bag against her abdomen. “Oh, just girly stuff,” she says.

Another boy on a bike skids up. “Girly stuff?” he says, displaying gleaming white teeth. “We likes girly stuff.” He looks at me aggressively. “How about you, mister? You like that shit?”

Over his head I see a fleet of medium-size bodies on bikes approaching.

“Give us a break, guys,” I say. “We’re just taking the air.”

“Oh, yeah?” says another boy, wearing a baseball cap like the rest, but with sunglasses shielding his eyes. “How about we takes the bag, then? And everythin’ you got in your pockets, big man?”

I puff out my chest and step toward him. “How about you guys go home to your mothers?”

The teenagers pull their bikes back and I grin triumphantly. Then I hear a deeper voice from behind me.

“You dissin’ the youth, whitey?”

I turn to confront a tall, heavily built young man, his hair in cornrows and his tracksuit top open to display a large silver pistol in his waistband. I hear the woman beside me inhale sharply. Before I react, she hands her bag to the armed man and clamps her hand on my arm.

“There’s our car,” she says, pulling me toward the corner.

The limousine has appeared silently, the driver standing on the curb with a radio handset at the side of his head.

The boys pedal away, cheering, while the young man saunters away. He drops my companion’s bag on the pavement. I go over and pick it up.

“Anything missing?” I ask, as I hand it over.

She checks. “Just my purse, with all the cash I brought,” she says. “And my passport.”

“Shit,” I say.

“Yeah, right,” says the driver. He holds the door open for my companion.

As we move off, I turn to her. “Sorry,” I say, in a low voice.

“Sorry don’t get you nowhere in this town, buster,” she says, in an accent like the driver’s.

I try to laugh, but I feel about two feet tall…

The scene stopped suddenly. I tried to bring it back, but there was nothing. I couldn’t remember anything else. Who was the woman? I was obviously close to her. Where was she now? Where was I? I blinked and then banged my forehead against the wall. The pain was intense, but strangely I felt better for it.

Sometime later, there was a crash at the door and a tray appeared at floor level. I went over quickly, but the narrow hatch was instantly slammed back down.

“Hey!” I shouted. “Let me out of here!”

There was no response. I couldn’t even hear any footsteps.

I examined the food on the tray. There was a cup of dirty-looking water, which I drank half of before I could stop myself. A hunk of discolored white bread and a piece of hard yellow cheese was all there was to eat. I wolfed them down, taking a small sip of water to soften each bite of the bread. When I’d finished, my stomach wasn’t even half-full and my throat was as rough as it had been before. And the temperature in the room seemed to have gone up to scalding.

I went back to the slanted bed and lay down. I tried to go back to Washington or to anywhere else that wasn’t as confined as the grave, but my mind remained blank.

Then the music started-ear-shredding, grinding rock at terminal volume. Pressing my hands to my ears did little to shut it out. The light on the ceiling started to flash irregularly. I turned my head to the wall, but it seemed to be shaking to the thunderous beat.

I had no idea how long that went on. Soon after the noise finally stopped, there was another crash at the door. This time, a round hole appeared at waist level. Before I could move, the muzzle of a hose sprayed freezing water in at high pressure, soaking me instantly. The jets of water stung my skin and I was forced to crouch at the far end of the bed, not that it gave much cover. I cupped a hand and swallowed, but had to spit immediately. The water tasted like something had died in it. Quickly, the level rose to my calves and the soiled blanket started to move towards the door. I grabbed it and tried to rinse the vomit from it. Then the spray stopped as suddenly as it had started and the water flowed away under the door.

I soon noticed that the heat had been turned off. I began to shiver violently.

Draping the sodden blanket over me did little to help. Then, without warning, the light went out.

I sat in the total darkness, my head in my hands. Why was this happening to me? What had I done to deserve treatment like this? I tried to conjure up the woman I’d seen again, tried to find anyone from my past. Nobody came. Maybe the scenes in Washington, wherever the hell that was, had just been the fruits of my imagination. Maybe nothing meant anything and I couldn’t even trust my own mind.

I fell away into an abyss, my breath rapid and my limbs locked by the chill.

The only thing I could hope was that I had died. Did that mean there was an afterlife? The idea was attractive. Perhaps I was in the underworld. Or in limbo. Or even purgatory.

Then the cold bit into me again and I was back in hell. It was obvious that whoever was doing this to me had a deep knowledge of cruelty and evil.

I had the feeling that I’d met more than one person like that in my unreachable past.

Two

I cowered in the dark for what seemed like an eternity. The cold grew even worse and I couldn’t control my shivering. I tried to sit without the damp blanket, but soon found that I needed the meager insulation it offered. At least the music stayed off, though the silence became almost as disturbing.

Finally, the scene in the place called Washington came back to me. At least I had some memory function. I still couldn’t remember who the woman was, or what we were doing there. What did the episode tell me about myself? That I was supposedly some sort of expert in crime. A policeman? A criminologist? In any case, I couldn’t have been very smart, insisting on going to a notoriously dangerous district and provoking the robbery. I hadn’t behaved in a very courageous fashion, either. In fact, I’d behaved like a major asshole. But the blonde woman didn’t seem to think so. She had submitted to my whim and had accepted the loss of her valuables without much concern. What did that say about her feelings for me? And something made me think she was some kind of crime specialist, as well. Were we both researchers? Cops? I couldn’t reach an answer that rang true and slapped the wall in frustration.

The blanket was making the skin on my shoulders and back itch. My nostrils were filled with the stench of vomit, which had somehow survived immersion in the water. I tried to breathe only through my mouth, but that made me cough heavily. Eventually I willed myself to sleep, but kept jerking awake in the darkness, my heart pounding. Finally, I fell like a stone into the pit, where scaly-skinned devils laughed at me in my nakedness, ramming rust-covered tridents into my flailing limbs…

Simultaneously the light came on and the door crashed open. Four men in gray uniforms covered by knee-length leather aprons burst in. Two carried long truncheons, which they dug into my armpits to raise me up against the wall. The others pulled a pair of what felt like paper trousers up onto my legs. I was lowered to the floor and a shirt of the same material was pulled over my arms. Not a word was spoken during the whole procedure. I opened my mouth to protest and one of the truncheons was pushed hard between my teeth. I got the message.

I was heaved out through the door and nearly collided with the wall on the other side of a dank corridor. The four men formed up around me and started to move forward. A truncheon in the small of my back made me stumble ahead, the muscles in my legs tingling from lack of use. I caught glimpses through open doors of other cells. Naked prisoners of both sexes stood with their legs apart and their arms raised to the side. They looked like they had been frozen in the middle of gymnastic exercises. But it was their eyes that were most striking-wide-open and bloodshot, staring across blankly at the wall above. Was that mindlessness the fate awaiting me-or could there be something even worse?

We moved on through more corridors, passing doors marked only with numbers. There was a faint smell of chemicals and the hum of machinery. The air seemed unnaturally dry. Then I was stopped outside a set of double doors. One of my escorts tapped the buttons on a touch pad and I was pushed through.

It was a large space, with lights shining at the far end.

My stomach clenched when I saw what I was being led toward.

The wooden post was taller than a man and about a foot wide. Ropes hung from it at neck, waist and ankle height. The untreated timber was stained a reddish-brown between the top and middle ropes. This was a place of execution.

I started shouting as I was dragged to it, demanding to know what was going on, but the men paid no attention. Two held me against the post, while the others tied the ropes tightly around me. They stepped away and I saw a line of men in the same gray uniforms moving toward me-these in berets, as well. They held old-fashioned rifles and stopped about fifteen yards away.

An officer with a pistol in his hand appeared at the side of the line. He gave me a contemptuous glance and then turned to his men.

“Ready!” he barked.

My heart was hammering and my eyes were wide. Even though the ropes didn’t allow much movement, my whole body was shaking.

“Aim!” the officer shouted.

“No!” I screamed, my voice breaking like a teenage boy’s. “No!”

“Fire!”

I was deafened by the thunder of the guns and blinded by the muzzle flashes. It was only when I opened my eyes that I realized I was still alive. I looked down at my chest and saw that the paper shirt was unblemished.

“Bastards!” I yelled. “What the fuck are you playing at?”

The line of men had turned their backs on me. They were marching into the dark at the far end of the room. The officer remained for a few seconds. He didn’t speak, but fashioned his lips into a grotesque and chilling smile. Then he, too, turned on his heel and paced away, the pistol still in his hand. At least there hadn’t been a coup de grace.

“Bastards!” I yelled again, straining at the ropes. Then I dropped my head and started to sob. I had become aware of a warm dampness in the paper trousers. I’d lost control of my bladder when the blanks had been fired. At first I felt ashamed, then anger coursed through me. I had no idea why I was being treated like an animal, but the fuckers in the gray uniforms weren’t going to get away with it. I raised my head and looked for someone to test my new resolve out on, but they had all gone. I was left on the execution post for what seemed like hours, my soaked trousers growing cold and uncomfortable. One thing I was sure of-I would pay my tormenters back.

Suddenly I remembered a face, that of a man, though it could have been a demon’s: iceberg-cold blue eyes beneath short fair hair, a smile that made the firing squad officer’s seem benevolent. The canine teeth, top and bottom, were sharply pointed and the tongue flickered between the incisors like a snake’s. I knew who he was; he had remained despite my deficient memory. He called himself the White Devil and he had made a list of people to kill in revenge for what they had done to him.

I blinked hard and inhaled deeply. The face faded. The White Devil. I couldn’t recall everything he had done, but I knew that I had resisted him. The irony made me laugh. My old enemy had inspired defiance in me, even while I was roped to the execution post. I was in the hands of ruthless men who could kill me-or pretend to-anytime they wanted, but I was still alive. I swore that they weren’t going to reduce me to the state of the empty-eyed souls I had seen earlier.

The men in the leather aprons eventually came for me and took me back to my cell. They ripped the paper clothes from me, their lips twisted in expressions of mockery and disdain, then shoved me inside. As soon as the door slammed shut, the nozzle was inserted and the cold water spray started again. I forced myself to take it full on and cleaned myself as best I could.

Later, a lump of bread and a piece of meat that I couldn’t identify came through the hatch. I made myself eat slowly to stave off stomach trouble. The water that came with the food was less discolored than before. After I’d finished, I started to exercise, doing push-ups and sit-ups on the damp floor. My muscles burned, but I kept my breathing regular. I was in reasonably good physical condition, which made me feel better.

I knew what would be coming next-the loud music. I kept some of the bread back and dampened it to make earplugs. Then I closed my eyes and concentrated on recalling the music I had listened to in the past. After a while, some names came back and I concentrated on each one, making as many connections as I could.

When the industrial noise started, I blocked my ears and started to repeat loudly the strings of words I’d constructed.

“Page, Plant, Bonham, Jones.

“Jagger, Richards, Jones, Wyman, Watts, Taylor.

“Crosby, Stills, Nash, Young.”

It was exhausting keeping the grinding music at bay and I often lost track of what I was saying. But eventually the constant repetition made me focus and I could remember particular songs and albums, which I fashioned into other strings of words.

“‘Since I’ve Been Loving You,’ ‘Black Dog,’ ‘Hot Dog.’

“‘Beggar’s Banquet,’ ‘Let it Bleed,’ ‘Exile on Main Street,’ ‘Sticky Fingers.’

“‘Woodenships,’ ‘Cathedral,’ ‘Almost Cut My Hair,’ ‘Ohio.’”

When the noise stopped and the light went out, I found that I was recalling rooms where I’d listened to the albums and faces of people who had been there.

Some of their names came back to me, too-David, Caroline, Andy. Names and faces, but nothing more…

They were enough. I was soaked and shivering, but I was still myself. I once had a life, and I was determined I was going to get it back.

Even if I still didn’t know who I was.

When the light came on again, I turned onto my front and managed to get some sleep. The strange shape and angle of the bed no longer bothered me. I wasn’t prepared to let anything get in the way of what was best for me, and I needed rest if I was to be able to fight my captors.

I awoke to the slam of the hatch at floor level. This time there was only a small cup of water. I wondered what that portended. I sniffed it, but didn’t pick up any suspicious smell, so I drank the contents. That was a mistake. After a few minutes, I began to yawn widely and struggled to keep my eyes open. Whatever substance had been in the water was either flavorless or was concealed by the earthy taste.

Suddenly the door crashed open. The men in leather aprons came in again. I tried to resist, but I had little control over my arms and legs. I couldn’t stop them from dragging me out, so I closed my eyes and tried to concentrate on something related to my past. If they were going to scare the shit out of me like they did with the firing squad, I needed a diversion. I looked down and concentrated on the scarring on my knee. Where did I get it? A car accident? A fall while skiing? I didn’t even know if I skied. Another sport? That seemed suggestive. Which sport? I saw a muddy field and players wearing brightly colored shirts. That was it. Rugby league. I saw myself holding an oval ball, breaking a tackle and then being hit from two sides at the same time. Blinding pain as my cartilage went.

I opened my eyes as I was pulled into a clean and well-lit room. People wearing green surgical suits were waiting. At first I thought my knee was about to be fixed, then I remembered what was going on. Behind the people was a bed with a long black box above it, cables and leads with suction pads hanging down. I couldn’t recall ever having seen anything like it.

The silent men in the leather aprons lifted me onto the bed and secured my arms and legs.

“Rugby league,” I said to myself. “Try. Drop goal. Penalty. Conversion.” I noticed that the underside of the box above me consisted of complex machinery-digital devices, electrical circuits and the like. I got a bad feeling about what was in store for me.

I smelled rubbing alcohol and felt a damp swab on my arm. Then a needle was slipped into a vein.

“Try. Drop goal. Penalty. Conversion,” I kept repeating.

I tensed myself to fight the loss of consciousness that I was expecting, but it didn’t come. I felt as if I were floating in the air, but I remained at least partly alert. The box above the bed was lowered, stopping only a few inches from my face. Then all the lights went out.

I kept silently repeating my rugby-league mnemonic. It was effective in countering the panic I was feeling in what had become a very enclosed space. Then lights came on all over the base of the box and a whirring noise started up.

“Hello,” said a soothing female voice. “Stay calm. Nothing unpleasant is going to happen.”

“Try. Drop goal. Penalty. Conversion,” I continued saying to myself.

Suddenly I felt latex-covered fingers on my eyes. They were pulling open the eyelids. Something metallic was attached to them and involuntary tears flowed. I wondered if they were going to blind me and my heart started to thunder. I tried to cry out, but found that my voice had gone missing.

“There we are,” said the woman. “That wasn’t too bad, was it?”

She was lucky I wasn’t able to tell her what I was thinking.

“Now, enjoy the show.”

A screen was lit up above my face. Strident martial music began to play and images of men in suits and the occasional woman appeared. I tried to identify them, but recalled no names. I had the impression they were all politicians, but I couldn’t be sure. Then the images started to change more rapidly and I lost track.

I went back to my rugby-league mnemonic, trying to ignore the pain around my eyes. But it was soon dashed from my mind as the brassy music rose to a crescendo and a picture of a hard-eyed man appeared. I knew I’d seen him before, I even knew he was the devil incarnate, but I couldn’t place him or remember his name.

The whir of the machine became louder and the images on the screen started to move so fast that I could no longer distinguish what they were. Then every nerve in my body seemed to be energized and I felt my back rise from the bed. I was being asked an incomprehensible question repeatedly, in a tone that required an answer, but I couldn’t speak, couldn’t scream as my whole being seemed to take fire and my head throbbed.

Then I heard the words at last.

“You will obey every command that you are given, will you not?”

I fought against the urge to respond positively, trying to get the words of my mnemonic going again. Then I saw how to give myself a chance.

“Yes,” I said, aware that the power of speech had returned to me. “Yes, I will obey every command.”

But deep down I was still repeating Try. Drop. Goal. Penalty. Conversion.

Until a siren sounded and I fell into the deepest of holes.

When I came round, I didn’t have a clue where I was. My head was ringing with strange sounds and I saw a blur of colors and shapes. Gradually my vision cleared, but my ears were still filled with discordant voices. There was a foul stench in my nostrils. I tried to move, but my arms and legs were confined. I looked down and saw that I had been tied to a wheelchair. I was wearing paper clothes again. I felt a twinge of alarm and glanced around. What I saw wasn’t reassuring.

I was at the back of a long hall with no windows. In the dim light I made out a mass of people of both sexes, their limbs jerking about. Many of them were young and muscular. They were all naked and were crying out words that I couldn’t understand. At the front there was a heap of large stones with a large upturned cross projecting upward from it. I began to get a very bad feeling.

Then a tall figure wearing a black robe appeared, hands raised high. I blinked and shook my head. I wasn’t seeing things. The face was larger than it should have been and seemed to be carved out of stone. I remembered where I’d seen the like-on the sides of churches. An uglier…gargoyle…would have been hard to find, the features twisted, eyes bulging and nose spread wide as if having sustained heavy blows.

Another figure followed, this one clearly male-he was naked, a huge erection moving to and fro as he pranced about, cracking a short whip. But his head was not human. It was that of a carnivorous animal, its jaws open to reveal vicious yellow teeth, and without having to think, I knew immediately the word: hyena.

The gargoyle began to speak, the voice low and masculine. It sounded all around me, and I saw speakers on the walls. I also noticed the animal corpses hanging from the wooden panels-everything from rabbits and foxes to large creatures, bears. They must have been killed where they were suspended, as there was dark blood on the walls and pooled on the floor. That accounted for the stink. Looking closer, I realized that all the animals’ eyes had been mutilated. Some were hanging from their eye sockets.

“Silence, my fellow worshippers,” the gargoyle was saying. “Listen to the antiGospel of our lord and master. ‘In the beginning was the word, and the word was with Lucifer, and the word was Lucifer.’”

The people in the hall broke into loud screams of approbation. A particularly crazed young man caught my eye-he dragged his nails down his bare chest hard enough to draw blood. I had seen him before. He had been in command of the firing squad.

The gargoyle spoke again. “Our lord Lucifer demands a blood sacrifice today, as he does every day. Bring on the victim!”

The man in the hyena head ran to the side, wielding his whip, but I was struggling to keep my eyes open now. Images were cascading before them, lines of men in uniform that went on and on. Then everything abruptly disappeared.

As I fell into the darkness, I heard a long, desperate scream.

Three

Hinkey’s Bar was in a back street near the Washington Navy Yard, less than a mile south of the U.S. Capitol. It took up the ground floor of a crumbling building. The upper floors were home to a dope dealer, a producer of Internet porn, and several sad-eyed people who couldn’t afford anything better. Hinkey himself was in his seventies. He’d been a minor-league baseball player in his youth and his exploits on the diamond were all he talked about. He sat in a corner with a bottle of cheap bourbon in front of him, while his son-known to regulars as Hinkey Part Two because, paradoxically, he bore no resemblance to his old man-ran the place with an attitude that veered between indifference and scorn, depending on the state of his hangover.

Back in the seventies, Hinkey had realized the place wouldn’t last much longer on its clientele of working-class alcoholics and slumming students. He hit on the idea of hiring bands, particularly cheap and talent-free ones he could pay in beer. The old man was tone-deaf, so he didn’t care if the musicians played rock, punk, post-punk, grunge or whatever shit was in fashion. Not blues or soul, though. The black man’s music wasn’t his thing. He never got big crowds, but for three nights a week he made a half-decent profit. Hinkey Part Two wasn’t tone-deaf, but he was into equal opportunity-he hated all music and all the people who came to listen. As for the bands, they featured the worst kind of lowlifes-tuneless, loudmouthed, thieving scum. The only time anyone saw Hinkey Part Two smile was when the audience threw glasses at the musicians.

Old Hinkey still handled the bookings, mainly because he had more interest in turning a buck than his 220-pound son. He didn’t pay attention to the bands’ names, but he kept up with D.C. scuttlebutt enough to go only for acts that brought in some kind of crowd. He’d heard that Loki and the Giants were popular with long-haired, highly tattooed kids who dress only in black, so he closed the deal with the lead singer-of course they didn’t have a manager.

It turned out to be one of the worst decisions he’d ever made.

Loki was in what Hinkey called the dressing room. The proprietor had told him he used to take broads there back in the days when piss wasn’t all that came out of a dick. That explained why there was an ancient bed with a rat-chewed mattress along one wall. Maybe the cracked mirror on the opposite wall dated from then, too. Hinkey had put a battered table and a light under it, and called it a dressing table. Pity he didn’t pay more attention to his own dressing-the Hawaiian shirt he was wearing made Loki’s eyes burn.

Still, the singer thought, the shit hole had some good points. The so-called dressing room had a door that opened onto the yard at the back of the bar. It had been asphalted and there was just room for the band’s van to park there. That had saved them humping the amp, speakers and instruments through the front of the dive. It also meant that pussy could be checked in and out without anyone noticing.

Loki took out a Baggie and emptied some of the contents onto the table. That was another advantage to Hickey’s-it had a resident dealer upstairs. He chopped out a couple of lines and bent low to snort them. The stuff had been heavily cut, but it still did the job. He sat back and twitched his head, feeling greasy strands of his waist-length hair slap against his cheeks. Since he’d turned forty, he’d had to start dying it black-gray hair didn’t cut it when you were a thrash-metal Nazi satanist. He bared his teeth at the mirror. The lower part of his face was covered by a beard that reached his belly, while his cheeks and forehead had been tattooed with Viking runes and whorls. His arms bore similar designs in red and black. His prize tats-the ones that would have gotten him beaten up in the street or even arrested in some of the more liberal states, including the hyper-politically-correct District of Columbia-were under his black T-shirt. There was a ten-inch swastika on his chest and an Iron Cross hanging from the bottom hook, while the words I Am the Final Solution adorned his back in six-inch-high Gothic letters. If the audience was the right kind, he’d take a chance and strip off to give them the full show. He’d had Mein Kampf tattooed on his lower abdomen, with an arrow pointing to his groin. He didn’t think the Fuhrer would disapprove.

Loki-born Duane Speckesser-had come a long way from Wisconsin. His parents were third-generation Germans with a small farm. When he was a teenager, he got progressively angrier about their lack of interest in the Fatherland. His old man had served in the Airborne and was proud that he’d kept the victors’ peace in Berlin after the end of the Thousand Year Reich. As far as Duane was concerned, he should have hung his head in shame. A quarter of Americans had German roots, but very few of them showed any respect to the greatest German of all. Although the young Loki had little ability as a singer, he threw himself into the far-right music scene because he understood the power of songs to influence and inspire people. It also got him laid more often than his unprepossessing appearance would otherwise have merited. He had started off as a skinhead then found his real place in the underground metal scene that emerged in the eighties. He didn’t even have to sing anymore, as roaring vocals out was the preferred style.

Loki did another line and stretched his muscular arms. He might have put on a load of pounds, but he still worked out with weights on the long drives between gigs. The Giants were the most popular Nazi satanic metal band in the South and Midwest, but the opportunity to play the capital, the seat of the Zionist Occupation Government, was not to be turned down, even if Hinkey was paying peanuts-the old fucker had tried to pay them off with a couple of crates of beer, but Loki had put him right. Maybe he’d put him even more right after the show. Then again, Loki was doing pretty well, what with album sales on the Internet-his songs were bought around the world, thanks to modern technology-and with donations from clandestine far-right organizations that approved of his agenda. Compositions like “Aryan Race,” “Rise Up and Fight,” “Smoke over Auschwitz” and “We Are Satan’s Storm Troopers” had turned out to be real money-spinners. He had to be careful how he presented himself in public, though. That was why he’d chosen the name of Loki, the Norse trickster god, and given the other musicians giants’ names. He’d have preferred to have performed as the Children of the Fuhrer, but that would have gotten the ZOG and its pinko pals jumping like scalded cats. He’d been inside more than once and he wasn’t going back.

The singer stood up and slapped his black leather pants. They were getting tight; he could do with a new pair. Maybe he’d go shoplifting tomorrow. It was amazing how easy it was to rip things off when the rest of the band started brawling and threatening to throw up in shops. Which reminded him… Where were his sidekicks? There was less than an hour till showtime. The assholes had probably disobeyed his orders and gone into one of the black districts. It wouldn’t be the first time they turned up for a gig covered in blood. Still, it was good for the image.

There was a double knock on the back door. Loki opened up.

“Look what we got!” said Bergilmir, the stick-thin bassist.

“Fresh as a Dachau daisy,” added the guitarist Skadi, a podgy woman with dyed white hair down to her ass.

The drummer, Thiazi, pushed forward a young woman in a head scarf. “Guess what, big man? I reckon this one’s a virrrgin.” He smiled, revealing several missing teeth.

Loki grabbed the woman and pulled off her scarf. She had thickly curled dark hair. Around her neck was a gold chain with a small pendant. Loki pulled it off and let out a loud shout.

“A Star of David,” he said, looking at the band. “You finally got one.” He dropped the pendant and crushed it with his biker’s boot. “Right, you guys get ready in here. I’m taking the dog to the van.”

“Aw,” Skaldi moaned. “Can’t we watch?”

“Not this time,” Loki said. “I’ve got something real special planned for this piece of Yiddish meat.” He shoved the young woman toward the door. “No peeking,” he said, staring at the musicians.

They nodded sullenly but cheered up when they saw the bag of coke on the table.

Outside, Loki opened the rear doors of the ramshackle white van and dragged his victim in. She was whimpering, but she hadn’t given up struggling. When he ripped her blouse open, she let out a scream. The sound stopped abruptly when he slapped her cheek so hard that her head bounced against the sidewall. She slumped down, unconscious.

“Shit,” Loki said. “I was going to ram Big Adolf down your throat.” He unzipped his trousers. “Guess he’s going somewhere even wetter.” He grunted and pulled up the woman’s skirt.

It was then that he heard a faint noise outside.

“Get lost, you assholes!” he shouted.

There was no reply, but the sound of footwear on asphalt came again.

Loki lurched for the door. “Will you get the fuck out of here?” he said, opening it.

A figure stepped into view.

“No,” said a hoarse voice.

Loki took a punch to the face and crashed back onto the floor of the van. “Jesus,” he said, raising his hand and feeling blood. “You broke my nose.” He knew there was solid metal inside his masked assailant’s glove.

The figure in black came in and leaned forward, then punched him again. There was a crack as Loki’s left cheekbone broke and his head slammed back again. He screamed in agony.

“What is this?” he gasped. “I’ll let the bitch go.”

His assailant nodded. “Yes, you will. But I am not so merciful.”

Loki looked up in the dim light of the streetlight. He saw the glint of polished steel in each hand above him. Then he opened his mouth in horror, unable to move as a skewer rammed through each of his ears. The lead vocalist didn’t manage even a brief swan song before his brain shut down and he died.

The killer ripped open the dead man’s T-shirt, then removed a transparent plastic file containing a single sheet of paper from a jacket pocket and smoothed it over the swastika tattoo, before securing it to his skin by pressing a pin into each corner.

After checking the still unconscious woman’s pulse, the killer got out of the van, then closed the doors and walked at an unhurried pace toward the street, cell phone in hand.

Hinkey’s Bar wouldn’t be having a musical evening after all.