Bones and Bagger (Waldlust Series Book 1) Page 16

  I sat down in the chair Sparky vacated. He showed no appetite for an impromptu history session because instead of a walk down memory lane he took the path between the sofa and recliner. A few moments later I heard my bed creak. Perhaps he decided he could live with the doggie smell on my pillow. And the blood he’d spit on the bed.

  “Buried in Aachen,” I said loud enough for everyone in the flat to hear.

  “Who buried in Aachen?” asked J-Rod.

  “Charlemagne,” I said.

  “Too bad Homey,” J-Rod said. “Was she hot, man?”

  Helmet jumped to his feet in outrage. If I remembered correctly the Nazi Party coopted the Charlemagne mystique to prop up the notion of the Third Reich. But Helmet was no Nazi.

  I made a calm down gesture at Helmet. Only Sister Christian noticed. But Our Lady of the Day Old Underwear kept up the bagger conversation while pretending not to pay attention to me. The old finger twirl around my ear and quick point at J-Rod mollified the ghost. For exactly which German generation did calling someone crazy become the universal cure for hurt feelings? Not sure, but I used it to my advantage.

  Buried at Aachen or not buried at Aachen. If you believed Sparky. And why would Sparky care anyway? He wanted to kick himself after he opened his mouth. But it really started moments before that…when he looked at my computer and saw I’d been surfing Charlemagne. He hadn’t known I was watching him. Bad memories of love lost and an execution that made him move on to another life in another town? Maybe. But judging by his reaction, I didn’t think so.

  “Did I hear you mention Aachen?” That was Sister Christian.

  She’d acted like she wasn’t listening. Nice act. I learned long ago—and I mean LONG ago—that women have radar dishes for ears. They’re able to pick up 100% of the stuff you don’t want them to hear and pretend like they’ve missed everything else.

  Lying was useless, so I said, “I did.”

  She said, “They have a nice cathedral there.”

  “Yes,” I replied, “Some famous people are buried there.”

  She held up her own smartphone.

  “I checked,” she said.

  “Checked what?”

  “The timetables.”

  I raised my eyebrows in the guy version of the doggie tilted head of intense concentration.

  “Deutsche Bahn,” Sister Christian said.

  “We can catch the S5 out of Bad Homburg at 10:45 and we’ll be there before 1:30.” She played with her phone and said, “We can depart Aachen before seven pm and get back to Frankfurt around nine.” She looked up. “You can make it back here and us to Wiesbaden before ten.”

  “We?” I said.

  Watanabe chimed in. “Don’t be an ass, Gare.”

  Like asking me not to breathe, but I’d give it a try. If he were implying that the bagging team somehow had become my comrades in arms, I was going to be an ass. Based on Sparky’s reaction, the Aachen trip did seem like a good idea, though.

  I kicked myself for not thinking of it, though the whole Charlemagne angle had just surfaced a few minutes earlier when Sparky did the evasive thing. Well, it really started the previous night, if you counted Helmet’s prodding. Sister Christian. One step ahead of me and she didn’t know all that I did about Sparky. If my brain continued to work as fast over the next few days? I was dead. Sister Christian. I wondered for a moment exactly how long she thought a single pair of panties could last. I wish I had that kind of confidence.

  We could have taken an hour to do the arguing thing. I’d say it’s too dangerous and none of their business. They’d respond with questions that went something like what could be more dangerous than what happened last night? Then they’d bang on about how whatever was happening was their business because those demons made it so. Besides, everyone had Sunday off. Almost everyone, that was. My schedule had a pop-up meeting with The Seven penciled in. I considered it a command performance.

  I decided against going back and forth for an hour and simply gave in. Before I break my arm patting myself on the back for being a quivering mass of humanity, truth is I couldn’t come up with a good reason to be the party pooper. How much trouble could the gang get into on a Deutsche Bahn train and in a cathedral? Even the gnarliest of demons would quiver in abject terror at the thought of sitting there with no ticket with the German conductor coming down the aisle.

  You need a PhD in computer science to run one of those ticket machines. Demons can think of a million ways to make a person miserable, consider it their core competency. On the other hand, they wouldn’t be designing rockets anytime soon. The thought of them huddled around the ticket machine and howling in frustration brought a smile to my face. No, the train would be safe alright.

  The cathedral? Probably. And that’s the best I could do these days. I’ve heard demons used to erupt in balls of fire if they got within a hundred yards of a church. That might be one of the reasons the local folks remained so faithful. Hard to deny some connection between a church and flaming big uglies running around outside. Not so much for the last few hundred years. At least not in Europe. Just a theory on my part, but it all ties in with hallowed ground versus common places.

  It’s not the building that matters, but rather the faith of the people who built it and of those who gather inside it. That’s what marks ground as hallowed. Or not. From what I’ve seen in the grand old church buildings dotting every city or hamlet of Europe today, the visitors come with cameras. Some fool in Bad Homburg turned the old church around the corner from Herr Doktor’s place into a concert hall. Why did anyone need demons when men did the work for them?

  Why all the detail on my thought process for deciding on the trip? To prove I’m not just a pretty face. And given what went down in Aachen, maybe I’m reaching for self-justification. A lot buzzed through my brain. And not just the craziness of the previous night. I mean, in addition to the knife in the back and the fights with Soyla, the pygmy cannibal, and the demons, I had an appointment with The Seven, Soyla lurking somewhere nearby, Sarah Arias and her demons working against me, I’d been outed as a vampire to my friends, and Karl had delivered a fresh pile on the floor. The dog never ate. Incredible.

  We’d go to Aachen. Broad daylight on the train, daylight in the cathedral. We could eat supper near the train station before heading home early in the evening. We’d all agreed on the schedule Sister Christian laid out for us. People around us the whole time. I could act both cooperative and inclusive and not expose my friends to that avalanche coming down the virtual mountain.

  Sparky’s strange reaction to Charlemagne had us on the move to Aachen. Cows in the chute? I didn’t think so, but with Sparky you could never be sure. Should I worry about everything that had Sparky’s scent on it? I’d be crazy not to. Did I think Sparky was running a game on me? Definitely. He’d have no qualms about collateral damage—my friends—but I hadn’t seen any reason to believe the bagger gang represented chess pieces on Sparky’s board.

  Everyone would hop the train in Bad Homburg. The plywood tunnel would be filled with scurrying Germans who’d trundle over any demon foolish enough to tarry for mischief. On the way home we’d split up in the large, busy Deutsche Bahn hub in Frankfurt. S-Bahn to Bad Homburg, S-Bahn to Wiesbaden. Everyone home. Everyone safe. Well, maybe not me, but I’d spent centuries living in danger from one thing or another so my life wouldn’t change.

  A trip to Aachen would get the gang off my back. More importantly, it would get them out of my apartment. And seeing normal life again, like rushing to catch the Deutsche Bahn and having a beer in Aachen, might make them not so much doubt the veracity of what they saw the night before, but cause them to play down the implications. Maybe then they’d forget to drill me with more vampire questions and we could return to our normal lives at the commissary. All upside, no downside. So why did I see Helmet standing and shaking his head?

  Chapter 23

  No idea what was on Helmet’s mind. The ghost could be vindictive—tampons—and c
ontrary—stepping over steaming Karl sculptures rather than cleaning up after his dog. And who knows why ghosts exist. Haunting implies misery for the living. If that’s the job description then no wonder Helmet got himself caught and shot as a spy. Don’t get me wrong, he’s a real pain in the neck. But the positives outweigh the negatives so the net is nowhere near misery. I love it when I talk in financial terms. Of course, maybe he’d just beaten me into submission.

  Helmet continued to shake his head. Contrary Helmet? Or was he just warning me to not put the smartphone and its treasure trove of Soyla photos in my pocket. Probably the second. I thought about the embarrassment of another trip to the ladies at German customs and placed the phone on the table. I didn’t need it anyway because anyone I might call would be going on the jaunt to Aachen.

  “You know how to access them,” I said to Helmet.

  “Access what?” said Watanabe.

  I felt no need to respond. I’d acquired an aura of vampire spookiness. I could tell because my friends seemed to be working extra hard to treat me normal. So if I had to put up with their baloney, no harm in taking advantage of the situation.

  Yes, things changed between my fellow baggers and me. But who could blame them after going a couple of rounds with demons and spending a good portion of the night hearing about my condition. And about my life. A life so long that none of them—normal people—could understand it vis-à-vis any frame of reference. Oh I’d still be one of the gang, I’d earned that much over the past couple of years. At the same time they’d form a subset within the group that didn’t include me.

  Sparky surprised me by declining the invitation. On the other hand, I couldn’t say I wasn’t pleased. If he came along it would be to shepherd us clear of anything important. And there’d be his constant yakking. We’d all end up so sick of his voice that we’d voluntarily give ourselves up to any demons that might cross our path. Anything to avoid Sparky.

  Bottom line, if Sparky wanted us to miss something about Aachen then he’d do best to come with us. He knew it the same as I did. And he decided to remain behind. Of course it could all be another of his manipulations, though I’ve made the mistake of giving him credit for extraordinary subtlety too many times to count. True enough, but I’d also made the mistake of underestimating his propensity for intrigue.

  Everyone gathered what they’d brought to my flat the previous night—that would be themselves—and we headed for the door. Sparky didn’t get out of bed to see us off. Probably better. I’d known the gang for a few years. Well, not just known them, I’d been a full member of the bagging clique. No doubt they were having a difficult enough time coming to grips with my condition. And there was that whole leprous sub world living alongside them each and every day they’d now need to consider. Having Sparky around—a stranger who looked the part of the cliché vampire—you get the picture.

  We went out the door and into the hallway that smelled more of stale tobacco than the average bowling alley in Raleigh before they passed the ban. I could hear Herr Doktor working to cough up one of his lungs…or perhaps he was thinking of Sarah Arias and laughing at whatever private joke they shared.

  Out the door and up the sidewalk toward Louisenstrasse, and back down the incline toward the train station. We stopped in the little Deutsche Bahn office and purchased roundtrip tickets. It was easier than using the machine—somebody’s credit card would end getting declined. It always happened that way with people earning just enough to scrape by.

  Forcing Frau Happy Train Chick to put down her cell phone and sell a ticket always made my day. Of course it wasn’t her real name, but that was how I chose to read that long German nametag. She spoke passable English, but I always pretended I didn’t understand. I think she thought it was cute…the way I’d ask her to repeat everything three or four times. It always ending with Frau Happy throwing my ticket at me.

  Pleasure radiated off her face when she saw me walk through the door with four additional customers. Frau Happy rummaged around her workspace for a moment as I walked up to the counter. It was a little bottle of pepper spray that she found in the top drawer and sat beside her keyboard. The lengths some people go to in order to conceal their joy.

  “Five tickets to Aachen,” I said. “One to return to Bad Homburg, four to Wiesbaden.”

  The look on her face made me wonder if I’d asked her to flash her boobies.

  “One ticket at a time, please,” Frau Happy said.

  So we did the necessary dance and she booked all the seats. The ticketing process is reminiscent of what the airline agents used to go through to book a flight in the early 1970’s. A lot of manual interaction. I waited until she was ready to push the print button and said,

  “And we all want reserved seats.”

  The look on Frau Happy’s face made the extra fifteen minutes worth the wait. None of the bagger gang said a word. They knew modern Germans as well as I did and I’m certain they expected the Deutsche Bahn Gestapo to break down the door at any second. They needn’t have worried because I knew exactly how far I could push Frau Happy.

  She handed me the tickets and I pretended not to notice a look in her eye that would have felt at home in Dachau. As soon as I had what I wanted safely in hand, I engaged Frau Happy in small talk. Germans don’t do small talk with people they don’t consider friends. I think they’d be more inclined to go ahead and do the boobie flash. Small talk between Frau Happy and me meant a hundred complex questions from me and a hundred one-word answers from her. We’re talking real fun here.

  Sister Christian stepped forward and grabbed my arm to guide me away from the counter.

  “Thanks,” she said to Frau Happy Train Chick.

  “Your son should learn to use the machines outside.”

  It didn’t sound much like “You’re welcome,” but at least it was a response. Frau Happy usually just gave me the two-eyed death dagger.

  “Please forgive him,” said Sister Christian, “my husband dropped him when he was young.”

  Frau Happy’s nodded. Made sense to her. It was the way things were done with simple people.

  “Bitch,” Sister Christian said after the door closed behind us.

  “Which one of you two are we talking about?” I said.

  “Ha,” she said. “My son?” And then, “Really,” in that final tone only the female half of our race—and some male Brits—can muster.

  That got a snicker from everyone and it felt like the old bagger gang as we joined the Saturday trickle of people working their way through the plywood tunnel. No demon ushers this time and the Germans had already repaired the hole made by the lone human attacker I threw through the wall. Did they retrieved Colossus or just brick him in? Guess it depended on EU labor laws.

  We boarded the S5 for Frankfurt on Platform 3 and did the twenty minutes without comment. The guys bought French Fries and beer at a stand in the Frankfurt main station and we found the track that would take us to Aachen.

  A lot of empty seats so we wasted our money on the reservations. I didn’t mind, though. Mainly because I wanted to keep an eye on everyone. And only partly because of safety. Even demons wouldn’t challenge the way things are done on Deutsche Bahn. The main reason I wanted us all together? To make sure the boys didn’t go off into their own cars to talk about things.

  Any eavesdropping German would consider them crazy. End of story. No harm. It was the possibility of French passengers that worried me. Those people swallowed just about any cock and bull story. With them, loose lips could end up causing me trouble.

  I slid into the seat next to Sister Christian and her stalwart underwear. The boys sat two in front, one behind. The train went direct so we’d avoid the hassle of getting off at an interim station and finding our way to the next ride. Sometimes DB cuts things close—like two minutes between arrival and departure. I let my seat back and pretended to sleep. Call me paranoid, but I was interested in what the guys might say. I tuned in with my Superfly hearing.

 
Sister Christian raised the armrest between us and made herself comfortable against me. She really did go to sleep. If anyone thinks we looked like a couple of lovers sitting there they’d be kind of right. No matter how sexy I thought Sister Christian looked and how often I obsessed over her foxy body, I cared more about her than that. Barf.

  That’s a fancy way of saying Sister Christian was too smart and experienced for me so it ain’t going to happen.

  Bonnie Prince MacDonald snored behind and J-Rod and Watanabe were happy to play games on their phones. The lull provided my first opportunity for clear thought since the tornado of confusion known as Hurricane Sparky arrived in the commissary parking lot. No matter how many brain cells I diverted from the mystery of Sister Christian’s private wardrobe, my total knowledge equaled nada.

  The trip to Aachen kicked off more out of blind instinct and a growing desperation to do something than it did anything else. Like maybe planning or a scientific approach to checking through the boxes and arriving at a hypothesis. On the other hand, I work best when I think the least. React to the punches. That probably sounds like self-justification for my inherent disorganization. Probably sounds that way because that’s what it is.

  I thought about things. Sparky’s reaction to Charlemagne got us all moving and I wondered again whether I caught a glimpse of something he didn’t want me see or if I saw something intentional. I still had that vague notion of a cow herded down the chute to slaughter. I shook it off. Sparky’s good, but he’ll never win an Oscar.

  German countryside passed by our window as I tried remembering everything I could about the look on Sparky’s face when he saw the Charlemagne pages up on my monitor. I also tried to recall all he said afterward. Nothing.

  Could a flame still burn in his heart for King Chucky’s weekend woman? That’s not Sparky. He could fill a twenty-seven volume encyclopedia with nothing but love escapades—good and bad—and need to update it with a yearbook every twelve months.