I Kill Monsters: The Revenants (Book 2) (34 page)

The vodka was smooth going down, and he’d put
away a lot of it in the last couple hours.

This guy, Mephisto, this guy was going to get
caught one day, Gritz knew, because they almost always did get
caught. And then the boys in the white lab coats and the ones with
all the initials after their names could figure out what motivated
him. In the meantime, the scumbag’s identity remained a mystery,
and his motivations, well, who knew what they were.

On the other hand, for Gritz, the Faust
legend wasn’t that hard to grasp. A scholar wages his soul against
the devil. Although Faust’s Mephistopheles was not the devil
himself, just one of his workers. Mephistopheles, a guide to Dr.
Faustus. This manifesto in the paper, a guide to what? The berserk
speculations of a maniac?

Therefore
:

1999
—
6
billion

2010
—
predicted
7
billion

2025
--???

Early 1800s a billion people on Earth, Gritz
had confirmed that online. He’d read how Goethe finished a
preliminary version of
Faust
in 1806, published it in 1808.
Revised and republished it in the late 1820s. Designed as a closet
drama, the play was never intended to be performed onstage. You
were supposed to read it alone, aloud to a small group maybe.

He skipped to another section of the
Manifesto, one of the haiku, this asshole all over the place with
his bullshit.

The
Noble
Mule

Inability

to
produce
fertile
offspring

hallmark
of
species

Doctor Faust turned to magic to find infinite
knowledge. Turned to magic to find truth and made a deal with the
devil. This Mephisto here and now, putting together all sorts of
bullshit, probably styled himself profound.

Perspicacity

To
stand

on
the
shoulders
of
giants
.

Better

to
stand
atop
the
weak

and
reach

the

heavens

on
a
human
scaffolding
.

The secondary sources on Faust were more
confusing than the play itself. Gritz sipped his vodka, already
drunker than fuck.

on
a
human
scaffolding
, the line sticking with him.

Phantom Redemption was playing over in Jersey
next weekend. He’d called Cath, left a message on her machine. She
hadn’t called him back yet. Gritz imagined she was busy, what with
the boys.

When Goethe’s Mephistopheles first appeared
to Faust in the doctor’s study, he told him
I
am
part
of
the
part
that
once
was
everything
. Part of the part that was
everything once.
Part
of
the
darkness
which
gave
birth
to
light
/
That
haughty
light
which
envies
mother
night
...Gritz thought of space,
out there, above and around him, empty and cold. His mind was all
over the place.

What was interesting to him, and something
Gritz’d had no knowledge of before attending the lecture he’d gone
to, was Goethe’s fascination with vampires. Okay, maybe two poems
out of however many didn’t constitute a fascination. But Gritz
thought it fascinating that Goethe was writing about vampires
almost a century before Bram Stoker’s
Dracula
.

There was the
Bride
of
Corinth
for one.

Young guy arrives in Corinth looking to marry
the daughter of a friend of his father’s. Becomes apparent
something’s not kosher with his betrothed right off the bat: she’s
wearing a veil, has very white hands, moves in a glide, and only
visits him at night. By stanza twenty-four she’s confronting her
own mother in front of the guy, accusing her,
It
contents
not
thee
/
To
have
driven
me
/
An
untimely
shroud
of
death
to
wear
? Goethe’s bride
telling her mother
from
out
my
coffin’s
prison
-
bounds
/
By
a
wond’rous
fate
I’m
forced
to
rove
. Tells
her mother to open her grave for her and the guy,
That
the
flames
may
give
the
lovers
rest
!

Gritz thought he got most of that one, though
the translation left a little something to be desired. It was
another poem, Goethe’s
Skeleton
Dance
, which confused
him. It’s midnight in a church graveyard. The graves open and the
warder is left to wonder at the shrouded men and women who come out
of them. The dead take off their grave clothes—
And
as
no
person
thought
about
modesty
there
, Gritz smiled at that part,
They
flung
off
their
garments
,
and
stripped
themselves
bare
—and they dance. The warder’s watching
all this, apparently unobserved or the dead don’t care, Gritz
couldn’t tell. The warder takes one of the death shrouds that’s
been cast aside and hides behind the
church
portal
,
which Gritz figured meant the church door.

When the dead
grow
tired
of
their
fun
, they put their clothes back on
and return to their graves.

Except one.

The one whose shroud the warder has
taken.

The skeleton can’t find its clothes, can’t
get back in the ground. It starts to climb where the warder is
hiding, reaching out to for the garment. The warder’s thinking it’s
all over for him when the sky turns
dun
and the skeleton
crumbles to pieces.

Gritz pushed the Manifesto aside, amid
The
Bride
of
Corinth
and the
Skeleton
Dance
, a mess of papers and documents. As
far as he could tell, whoever this nut job was had nothing in
common with Goethe’s villain other than a name.

But it couldn’t be just a coincidence.
Faust’s play had some kind of significance to this schmuck. The
question was, what was the significance? Gritz felt it was right
there staring at him, in the Manifesto, the poems, the secondaries,
the play itself. Staring at him and he just couldn’t see it yet.
But it would come to him, it would click. Thing was not to tear his
hair out waiting for it to happen.

He’d put a photographed lithograph of
Mephistopheles on his wall, Mephistopheles flying overhead, a
winged demon. Naked and taloned, looked like angel wings. Gritz sat
back in his chair, one arm crossed over his stomach, a hand on his
jaw. He stared at the lithograph, wondering. The city of Wittenberg
beneath the beast. Eugene Delacroix had painted it in 1828. Gritz
wondered if the drawing went along with the revised
Faust
.

Restless, he leaned forward and picked up a
copy of an article he’d been meaning to read.
Concerning
the
Changes
in
the
Completed
Part
I
(
1808
)
as
Compared
with
the
Earlier
Versions
of
Goethe’s
Faust
. By an A.B. Faust from Cornell
University—how funny was that, the name. Published in
The
Journal
of
English
and
Germanic
Philology
back in 1939. People made careers of reading and
writing things like this.

Gritz couldn’t imagine.

He sipped his vodka, laying the article
aside, atop the others he hadn’t read yet.

The hell was he doing spending his nights
pouring over this stuff anyway? It was driving him mad. The Yankees
had swept the Padres in four straight games and he’d barely watched
the series. Even tonight, he should be out celebrating someplace.
But his mind kept coming back to these murders, to this
Manifesto.

Better

to
stand
atop
the
weak

and
reach

the

heavens

on
a
human
scaffolding
.

From his experience, it was easier talking to
people than reading stuff like these secondaries. Cornell’s A.B.
Faust was long dead by now, no doubt. Who’d Gritz know that might
be able to answer some questions for him? And questions about what
anyway?
That
was part of the problem. What was Gritz going
to say, look, there’s this matter—police business—it’s got
something to do with a dead German Romantic poet, some kind of tie
to him, maybe, or one of his plays.

The connection was tenuous at best. For all
Gritz knew, the killer was creative with his choice of names and
that was it. Goethe’s connection to the murders was flimsy, like
Gritz’s whole involvement in this. It was police business. He
wouldn’t be lying about that, if that was what he told somebody,
but it was police business he was—at best—only tangentially
involved with.

Captain Rose got wind of what he was
occupying himself with, Gritz’s connection would be severed.

In the meantime he had over a dozen dead
bodies and no answers.
That
was his case. That was his
job.

That professor from the lecture, he’d be
interesting to talk to. Gritz wondered how he’d go about tracking
the guy down. He had the flier somewhere. Could find the guy
online, find out where he taught.

The phone rang and Gritz sat up straight in
his chair, not expecting it. Who’d be calling him here this time of
night? He picked the receiver up before it could ring a second
time, thinking it was Cathy or one of the boys, hoping…

“Hello.”

“Hiya, detective.”

He recognized the voice.

“What can I do for you?”

“Actually, I’m calling about something we can
do for you.”

“Who’s we?”

“You’re not working Sunday.” Stating it like
he knew it for a fact. “Meet us Saturday night, downtown near City
Hall, next ta the park.”

“What for?”

“Take a shooftee with me mates and I.”

“A what?”

“You want answers detective. We’ll provide
them. Have a good night then.”

The man calling disconnected.

Gritz was left with the phone in his hand,
looking at the receiver. This whole thing was so…odd. He hung up
the phone and picked up his drink. When he finished it he’d turn
in, think how to track down that doctor the next day.

“What you all niggas up to?”

Terrance Watkins and his buddy Marquis were
sitting on one of the few remaining benches in the quad when Ronald
led Red Fred over to them in the dark, Ronald gripping Fred’s wrist
in one hand, a joint in his other. Marquis had spoken.

“Fred’s trippin’ yo. Move over.” Terry and
Marquis scooched over, making enough room for Ronald to sit his fat
ass down. Fred sat next to the bench, his head lolling back in his
hoodie, a vacant look in his eyes.

Marquis reached across and waved a hand in
front of Fred’s face. It took a second to draw Fred’s attention. He
smiled a dopey grin.

“Trippin’ on what yo?” Terry asked.

“This smoke Juan rolled.”

“What’s in that shit, yo?” Marquis scrunched
his nose up at the stench the joint gave off.

“Heaven.”

“Let me see that bone here yo.” Ronald handed
it over to Marquis, who eyed the joint suspiciously before taking a
hit.

“I don’t know,” Marquis remarked dubiously as
he exhaled. “I don’t feel nothin’.” He handed the joint to his boy
Torell.

“Wait till it hit you,” Ronald promised.
“Hey, any you niggas got something to eat? I’m hungry.”

“Yo,” Terry exhaled. Like Marquis, he wasn’t
feeling anything either. “You heard Luke got jumped again.”

“Yeah,” Ronald yawned. “I ain’t even seen
Marquis or Yure. Them niggas must be hiding out or something.”

“Something ain’t right,” noted Marquis.

The joint made its rounds, Fred too high to
smoke any further, Fred giggling to himself.

“He in his own world, ain’t he?” Marquis was
leaning forward to consider Fred sitting there. When he sat back he
felt it. This shit was on. “Whoa. Now we talkin’.”

Terry inhaled deep and held it. His momma
caught him out here smoking this weed, she’d call him out in front
of his friends, make him come home. But how was she gonna do that,
his momma working at the nursing home tonight. DeAndre at home,
probably up in his room reading one of his books. Terry let the
smoke out of his lungs, and suddenly he wasn’t thinking about his
momma or brother.

“This is some good shit here, yo.”

“Damn I’m hungry,” Ronald said some time
later, sounding like he was fighting off sleep and losing the
battle. The boys huddled together for warmth.

“Yo, ain’t that your mom’s friend?” Marquis
asked and it took Terry a few beats to catch his meaning. A
homeless man was walking past on the quad, pushing a shopping cart
loaded down with his personal belongings, giving the boys their
distance in the night. “Wendell or something, right?”

It took Terry a few more moments to remember
the man’s name and by then the man had disappeared in the dark.
“Barry.”