I said, "If you'll lend me one of these fancy spellcheckers, I'll take a Sunday shift myself. I know a lot of people would rather worship than work then, but that's not a problem for me."

"I think I'll take you up on that," Higgins said after a few seconds' thought I'd figured he would; the constabulary doesn't draw a whole lot of Jews. I wrote down my home phone number and gave it to him. "You'll hear from me," he promised.

"I hope I do." I have to confess: I had an ulterior motive, or at least part of one. The dealers at a swap meet get in early, so they can set up. I figured I'd bring Judy along, and after we were done with the checking (assuming we didn't find anything), we could spend the rest of the day shopping.

Like I said, you can find just about anything at a swap meet v A couple of days after we put Cuauhtemoc Hemandez out of business, Sublegate Higgins did indeed call me to set up Sunday surveillance at one of the Valley swap meets. That evening, I called Judy to see if she could come along with me. As I'd hoped, she could. After we'd made the date, we kept on talking about the whole expanding case for a while.

I was saying, "If Hemandez can show he gave Lupe Cordero that vile potion out of ignorance rather than malice, he'll get a lighter sentence than he would otherwise." °I don't think ignorance is a proper defense in case like that," Judy said. "If a cwandero doesn't know what he's doing, he has no business trying to do it." Dealing with grimoires every dav, she takes an exacting view of magic and its abuses.

"I'm not sure I agree with you," I said. 'Intent counts for a great deal in sorcery. It-" I heard a noise from the front part of the flat and broke off. "Listen, let me call you back. I think somebody's at the door."

I went out to see who it was: most likely one of my neighbors wanting to borrow the proverbial cup of sugar, I figured.

But somebody wasn't at the door, he was already inside, sitting on a living room chair. I could still see the chair through him, too, so it was somedisembody.

"How'd you get in here?" I demanded; as I may have said, I have more than the usual line of home security cantrips. I gave fair warning: "I forbid thee, spirit, in the name of God - Adonai, Elohim, Jehovah - to enter within this house.

Depart now, lest I smite thee with the consecrated blasting rod of power." You don't (or you'd better not) bluff when you say you're packing a rod; mine was in the hall closet behind me.

But the spirit didn't move. Calm as could be, he said, "I think you'll want to reconsider that." He traced a glowing symbol in the air.

If you've ever been to a light-and-magic thrillshow, you probably think you know that symbol. As a matter of fact, the one you think you know isn't the genuine article: close, but not quite. Only specially authorized beings may sketch the true symbol and have it take fire for them. I happen to know the difference. My eyes got wide. An ordinary Joe like me never expects to meet a real spook from Central Intelligence.

"What do you want with me?" I asked hoarsely.

The CI spook looked me over. "We take an interest in HuitzilopochUi," he said. "Maybe you'll tell me what you know about the recent manifestation you uncovered."

So I told him. And as I talked, I found myself wondering just what the devil I was getting into. Every step into the toxic spell dump case seemed to drag me deeper into a polluted ooze from which I feared I'd be lucky to escape with my soul intact After I was through, the spook sat there for quite a while without saying anything. I watched him, I watched the chair through him, and I tried to figure out how the puzzle pieces fit together. Evidently my visitor from Central Intelligence was doing the same thing, because he finally said, "In your opinion, what, if anything, is the relationship between the various elements you have outlined: the leaking spell dump, the monastery arson, the possibilities inherent in the Garuda Bird project, the decline of the local Powers, and this trouble with the curcmdero and his potions?"

"I didn't think there was any connection between the Chumash and the rest of the mess," I exclaimed; that hadn't even occurred to me. "As for the other things, I'm still digging, and so is the Angels City constabulary. If you want my gut feeling, I think some of the other things will prove tied together, but I don't see how right now - and I don't have any sort of evidence to back me up."

"Never underestimate the value of gut feelings," the spook said seriously. "You ignore them at your peril. The finding at Central Intelligence is essentially the same as yours; otherwise they would not have sent out a spectral operative" - that's spook-talk for spook-"to bring an overview back to D.StC."

Etheric transport is of course a lot quicker than the fastest carpet: the spook could just cut directly through the Other Side from the District of St. Columbaand back, a privilege denied to all mere mortals save a handful of saints, dervishes, and boddhisatvas, none of whom, for various good reasons, was likely to be in the employ of Central Intelligence.

I said, "Since you've come crosscountry to interview me"-that seemed a politer phrase than interrogate me - "maybe you'll tell me something, too." When the spook didn't say no, I went on, "Is this case somehow connected with worries about the Third Sorcerous War?"

The spook got up from the chair, took a couple of steps toward me. "How did you make that connection?"

His voice was quiet, and cold as hemlock moving up toward the heart. He took another step in my direction. I don't have a big front room; he was already halfway across it.

Three more steps and he could do - I didn't know what, but I'd read enough spy thrillers to make some guesses: reach inside my head and pinch off an arteiy, maybe. Unless a good forensic sorcerer helped do my autopsy, I'd go into the Thomas Brothers' demographic records as just another case of apoplexy, younger than most.

I slapped backward, yanked open the closet door, whipped out the blasting rod, and pointed it at the spook's midsection. "Back off!" I told him. This rod is primed and ready - all I have to do is say the Word and you're cooked."

Of course, my flat would be cooked, too; a rod operates on This Side as well as the Other. But I figured I had a better chance of escaping from a burning flat than from a CI spook.

He stood very still. He didn't come forward, but he didn't move back, not even when I thrust the rod out toward him.

As he had before, he said, "I think you'll want to reconsider that. Unless you're packing something very much out of the ordinary, you'll hurt your books and furniture much more than me."

I knew the military had developed some high-level protection for their own spectral operatives; it seemed reasonable that a Central Intelligence spook would enjoy the same shielding. Come to that, some of the goetic technology has trickled down to the Underworld, which makes constables unhappy. On the other hand - "This is a Mage Abramelin Mogen David Special," I said.

"I don't care how well you're warded against Christian or Muslim magic: this is the fire that dealt with Sodom and Gomorrah."

Now the spook backed up. Being transparent, his features were hard to make out, but I thought he looked thoughtful.

"You could be bluffing," he said.

"So could you."

"Impasse." He went back to the chair, sat down again. I lowered the rod, but I didn't let go of it The spook said,

"Since we are uncertain of each othefs powers, shall we proceed as if the recent unpleasantness had not taken place?

Let me ask you again, with no threat intended or implied, why you believe this case my be connected to national security issues."

"Well, for one thing, why would you have walked through my door if it weren't?" I said.