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He told them about the gros bon ange, about their specific incarnations of it, about his origins in the laboratories of Tulane, and was satisfied to see Downey and Clea exchange worried glances. The hunting knife hung loose in Papa Salvatino’s hand, and his breath was ragged. Simpkins’ Adam’s apple bobbed. They were already nine-tenths convinced of the supernatural, and his account was serving to confirm their belief. He pitched his voice low and menacing to suit the mood created by the creaking timbers of the boat and began - again, to his surprise - to tell them of the world of Moselantja and the purple sun, the world of the gros bon ange. It was, he told them, a world whose every life had its counterpart in this one, joined to each other the way dreams are joined, winds merge and waters flow together; and whose every action also had its counterpart, though these did not always occur simultaneously due to the twisty interface between the worlds. And there were many worlds thus joined. In all of them the Yoalo had made inroads.

  ‘To become Yoalo one must be gifted with the necessary psychic ability to integrate with the suits of black energy,’ he said. ‘And all here rank high in the cadres, servitors to one or another of the Invisible Ones, the rulers of Moselantja. Legba, Ogoun, Kalfu, Simbi, Damballa, Ghede or Baron Samedi, Erzulie, Aziyan. Men and women grown through much use of power to stand in relation to ordinary men as stone is to clay.’

  The story he told did not come to him as invention, but as the memory of a legend ingrained from childhood, and in the manner of Yoalo balladeers - a manner he recalled vividly - he gestured with his right hand to illustrate matters of fact, with his left to embellish and indicate things beyond his knowledge. It was with a left-handed delivery, then, that he had begun to speak of his mission on behalf of the cadre of Ogoun, when Clea broke for the stairs.

  ‘Where you goin,’ sister?’ Simpkins caught her by the arm.

  ‘I ain’t havin’ nothin’ to do with this,’ she said, struggling.

  ‘Me, either,’ said Downey, moving toward the hatch.

  ‘What the hell’s wrong with you?’ said Papa. ‘You know he ain’t walkin’ away from here.’

  ‘He’ll come back,’ said Clea, her voice rising to a squeak. ‘He’s already done it once.’

  ‘In the cadre of Ogoun,’ said Donnell, wondering with half his mind what Jocundra could be doing behind him, ‘there is a song we call “The Song of Returning.” Hear me, for it bears upon this moment.

  ‘The sad earth breaks and lets me enter.   My dust falls like the ashes of a song   Down the long gray road to heaven.   Yet as do the souls of the fallen gather   And take shape from the smoke of battle,   Casting their frail weights into the fray,   Influencing by a mortal inch   The thrust and parry of their ancient foes,   So will I return to those who wrong me   And bring grave justice as reward.   To those who with honor treat me,   I will return with measured justice,   No more than is their due.   And those who have loved me, a few,   To them as well will I return,   And all those matters that now lie between us   Will then be full renewed.’

  Cautiously, walking heel-and-toe so as not to be heard below decks, the Baron sneaked away from the hatch and back to Jocundra, who crouched in the prow.

  ‘We need a diversion,’ he said, wiping his brow. ‘All four of ‘em’s down there, and both Simpkins and Papa gon’ be packin’ knives. That’s too much for me.’

  He looked around, and Jocundra followed suit. Something pink was sticking out from the door of the pilot house: a rag smeared with black paint. She peeked into the door. There was a box of rags against the wall, other rags scattered on the floor.

  ‘Fire,’ she said. ‘We could start a fire.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said the Baron; he considered it. ‘Hell, we ain’t got time to think of nothing better. All right. See that far hatch? That goes down to the hold next to theirs. Here.’ He gave her his cigarette lighter. ‘You tippy-toe down there ‘cause them walls is thin, and you pile them rags against the wall they behind. You be able to hear ‘em talkin.’ Soon as you get ‘em goin’, you gimme a wave and then yell like your butt was on fire.’ He shook his head, dismayed. ‘Damn! I don’t wanna get killed ‘bout no damn green-eyed monkey!’

  He took off his jacket and wrapped it around his forearm and pulled a switchblade out of his trousers. ‘What you starin’ at, woman?’ He cast his eyes up to the heavens. ‘They gon’ stick him ‘fore too long. Get your ass in gear!’

  She gathered the rags, and carrying an armful of them, made her way to the hatch. The stairs creaked alarmingly. Voices sounded through the wall opposite the stair, some raised in anger, but the words were muffled. As she heaped the rags, something scurried off into the corner and she barely restrained an outcry. Holding her breath, not wanting to give herself away in case of another fright, she touched the lighter to the rags. The cloth smoldered, and some of the paint smears flared. She was about to bend down and fan them when, with a crisp, chuckling noise, a line of fire raced straight up the wall and outlined the design of a three-horned man in yellow-red tips of flame. It danced upon the black boards, exuding a foul chemical stink, seeming to taunt her from the spirit world. Terrified, she backed toward the stairs. Two lines of fire burst from the hands of the three-horned man and sped along the adjoining walls, laying a seam across their midpoints, encircling her, then scooted up the railings of the stairs. More fire spread from the central horn of the figure, washing over the ceiling, delineating a pattern of crosshatches and stickmen, weaving a constellation of flame and blackness over her head. Forgetting all about waving to the Baron, she ran up the stairs, shouting the alarm.

  Clea brought her knee up into Simpkins’ groin, and he went down squirming, clutching himself. She and Downey clattered up the stairs just as Jocundra shouted. Donnell saw smoke fuming between the boards behind him. He turned back. Papa Salvatino was coming toward him, swinging his knife in a lazy arc, his head swaying with the movement of the blade. Then the hatch cover was thrown aside, light and a thin boil of smoke poured in, and the huge shadow of the Baron hurtled down the stairs. He dropped into a crouch, his own knife at the ready.

  ‘Get your ass away from him, Papa,’ he said.

  Simpkins groaned, struggled to rise, and the Baron kicked him in the side.

  Papa did not reply, circling, and in the midst of a step he made a clever lunge and sliced the Baron’s chest with the tip of his knife, drawing a line of blood across his shirt front.

  ‘Hurry!’ shouted Jocundra from the hatch. ‘It’s spreading!’

  Simpkins rolled off the floor, still clutching his groin, and limped up the stairs. Jocundra cried out, but immediately after called again for them to hurry.

  Flames began to crackle on the wall behind Donnell, and as he looked, they burst in all directions to trace the image of a woman very like Otille. It might have been a caricature of her, having her serpentine hair, her wry smile: a fiery face floating on the blackness. Donnell got to his feet, weak from Papa’s manipulations; too weak, he thought, to engage Papa physically. He searched around for a stick, any sort of weapon, and finding none, he dug into his pocket and pulled out a handful of coins.