They stepped through together without difficulty, for animated souls were highly malleable. Zane did not feel at all thin or translucent, the way the souls he handled were; he seemed quite solid to himself.
Now they stood in a kind of furnace room, with open fires burning in a ring around them, smoke billowing up to obscure whatever ceiling there was. The air was hot.
"Welcome to Hell, Death," Satan said, extending his hand. It was red with fine scales, and the fingernails were talons. Zane hesitated, but then went ahead and accepted the hand. It was best to keep this as polite as possible.
The hand was hot, but not burning. "No place like the present," the Prince of Evil said briskly. His head, too, was more pronounced from this close vantage. His horns were larger and brighter than they had seemed before; canine teeth gleamed before his thin lips, and his hair resembled a ripple of flame. "These cursed souls tend the central heating plant of Hell, performing useful labor while expiating their burdens of sin."
Zane looked at the people. Some had shovels that they used to put coal on the fires. The heat where they worked was terrible, but they wore asbestos aprons to shield their bodies from the worst of it. Zane knew they were souls with very little physical substance, but since he was in soul form himself at the moment, they seemed substantial. "What is the point?" he asked. "I realize Hell has to be heated, but you could set up an automatic conveyor belt for the coal — "
"These are the souls of people who abused their status in life," Satan explained. "They had responsible positions in industry, overseeing the heating plants of manufacturing companies, apartment buildings, and such. Instead of striving for efficiency and comfort for their clients, they exploited them, refusing to modernize, though they knew people suffered as a result. Now they expiate that sin by laboring under the primitive conditions they forced on others."
Zane studied the laborers. His apartment on Earth, before he became Death, had been intermittently cold in winter because, he suspected, the landlord was fattening his profit margin by skimping on heating fuel. Zane could appreciate Satan's rationale. "How do they expiate their sin?" he asked. "Do they have to shovel a certain number of tons of coal, or what? How long does it take, and what happens to them when they've paid their debt?"
"Excellent questions!" Satan said, glowing with more than human animation. "The term of penance varies with the individual. Roughly, each soul must labor until it has suffered the same amount as it inflicted on others during its life. That can take time; and, of course, some souls are incorrigible. It is not merely the labor, but the attitude, that counts; the soul must sincerely repent its prior evil. Eventually each soul will be purified by suffering, and will at last qualify for release to Heaven."
"So souls aren't condemned to Hell for Eternity?" Zane asked, surprised.
Satan issued his pleasant laugh again. "Of course not! Hell is merely the ultimate reform institution, where the cases too difficult for Purgatory are handled. A truly evil or indifferent person can not be cured by gentleness. Here in Hell we have the mechanisms to straighten out even the most crooked souls. I assure you, by the time any soul qualifies for Heaven, it has become quite gentle. I am a perfectionist; I will free no soul before its time." And Satan's countenance assumed an infernally noble aspect. Zane remembered that Satan was reputed to be a fallen angel; maybe some angelic element remained in him.
"But what about the bureaucratic errors?" Zane asked.
"Honest mistakes are possible."
"No. Not when I'm in charge. I can guarantee absolutely that not one defective soul has been sent from Hell to Heaven."
Molly had been poking around by herself. Now she returned to Zane. "I don't know any of these folk. Let's take a look at the Ireland section."
But already Satan was showing the way to another region. He opened a door in air, and they stepped through to a foggy, gloomy region crowded with people garbed in rags. Men, women, and children of every race plodded along a barren plain. Each was gaunt, and some were emaciated. All stared unwaveringly at the ground.
"These are the wasteful," Satan explained. "They threw out good food unused, knowing that others in the world were starving. Now they are hungry themselves. They squandered money; now they have only what they can find lying in the street, the refuse of others. They destroyed good clothing in the name of frivolous fashion; now they have only bad clothing, which they value more than all the garments of life. They must save in death as much as they wasted in life — and their resources are meager here."
Again Zane was impressed. He had once approached a paper-towel dispenser in a nonmagic public lavatory — he had distrusted magic sanitary facilities, as some used the refuse to fashion voodoo dolls, and that could be a literal pain in the posterior — only to see the man ahead of him snatch the last three sheets and throw them away almost unused. He had been furious at that callous anonymous waster, but had not spoken up because the man had been large and aggressive. Now Zane felt a kind of vindication. Such people certainly needed to be punished!
"You see. Hell performs a necessary service," Satan said smoothly. "We would not want wasteful louts littering Heaven."
"I don't know anybody here, either," Molly muttered. "I think this is a showcase section, not the real inferno."
"Why don't you go seek out someone you do know?" Satan suggested. "I had understood you were along to guide Death, but if you insist on mixing in your personal business — "
"Let's go next to the Irish showcase," the ghost said rebelliously.
"I have many more enlightened sets," Satan said. "There is little point in subjecting ourselves to the abuse of the unmitigated tempers of Ireland."
"Oh, is that so!" Molly exclaimed, showing her own unmitigated temper.
Satan glanced about as if seeing something invisible to the others. "For example. Hell's Kitchen." He opened a door on a huge room filled with fat chefs who were baking and cooking and mixing drinks. The odors of fresh foods were almost overpoweringly strong, making Zane hungry, though he had recently eaten.
"Try an aperitif," the Prince of Evil said, lifting a sparkling glass from a tray an elegant waiter brought and proffering the drink to Zane.
"Don't touch it!" Molly cried. "Anyone who eats or drinks anything in Hell can never escape it!"
Satan's mouth stretched down in affected sadness. "I had thought such superstition was beneath you, fishwife. I have no need to trap people in Hell! They come to Me because their souls are burdened with sin."
"What about Persephone and the six pomegranate seeds?" Molly demanded.
"I will thank you to leave My private life out of this!" Satan snapped, and small sparks radiated from the tips of his horns. "She wanted to stay; the seeds were merely a pretext to satisfy her image for her domineering mother."
"Then what's all this fancy food for?" Molly asked, showing her Irish stubbornness. "You never feed it to any of my friends who are imprisoned here, I'm sure! I've visited here before, you know."
"You have visited limited regions before, snippit," Satan told her. "You have not seen the complete Hell or comprehended any part of its purpose."
"That's my complaint!" she said. "You're hiding something, Foul Fiend! You refuse to tell what the food is for."
Curls of smoke rose from Satan's reddening hide. "For the cadre, of course, slut! They receive privileged treatment. The finest gourmet food, beverages, entertainment — " He gestured, and a chorus line appeared: shapely nude girls kicking their legs in unison. "I would be happy to provide this service for you in Purgatory, Death; My cooks and girls are able to go that far."
"I already have a staff at the Deathmansion," Zane said.
"Ah, but not a staff like this! You have never experienced the delicacies these cooks generate; not Bacchus himself ever feasted like this. And My personal tailor will create for you a suit that Solomon in all his evanescent glory could not match. And for your nocturnal entertainment, the Queen of Love and Sex, Isis herself, shall attend — "