PART ONE: LES MORTES

      Riding the escalator up from the Powell Street BART Station, Joey Spelvin spotted Al at his post in front of the Woolworth Building. Instead of the wooden flute he usually tootled to attract attention and garner spare change, Al now banged on a hand-held electronic organ attached to a speaker that had seen better days. The racket was deafening, but most passersby paid Al no attention. Just another Market Street loonie.

      Joey approached and flicked two dimes into the aluminum bowl at Al's feet. "How's it going today, Al?"

      Squinting out from under his greasy 49ers souvenir cap, Al took a few seconds to recognize Joey. He finally said, "OK, OK, OK," while slamming the organ keys at random.

      "Hey, Al," Joey said, "what happened to the flute you used to play?"

      "Got broke or stolen. Don't remember which." A woman in a brown coat and purple running shoes walked by. "Spare a quarter for food?" The woman stared straight ahead and wrinkled her nose slightly. "Have a nice day, lady."

      Joey said, "So where'd you get the music machine?"

      Al switched from a bossa nova beat to the fox trot. "Guy was selling them in the Haight yesterday. Some kids started hassling him. Took it while he was busy with them. Works real good, don't you think?"

      "Um."

      "Spare some change for a meal?" Al said to an old man smoking a large cigar.

      "Get a job."

      "Nobody appreciates fine music," Joey said.

      Al switched off the organ. "Gotta save the batteries. They wear out pretty quick if you're not careful." He set the instrument atop the speaker. He said to no one in particular, "Spare some change? Change for a meal?"

      Joey was pleased to see that Al was lucid today. He often lived in a world that corresponded only vaguely with what most people termed reality. Sometimes Al ranted about a global conspiracy involving Richard Nixon, Hugh Hefner and Charles M. Schultz. On other occasions, he merely sat on the pavement, huddled in his grimy khaki jacket and an old brown blanket, pulling on his lower lip and staring off into nothing.

      Today, Al was in good spirits, obviously pleased with his new toy. Joey wondered how long he'd get to keep it, before another street person stole it or Al himself misplaced it during one of his breaks with reality.

      Joey liked the people who hung out here at Halladie Plaza. Not the tourists, asking stupid questions about the cable cars and getting underfoot. Not the three-piece-suited corporados with business to do and clients to see. No, Joey liked the people. Folk like Mrs. Lenora Washington, who screamed about Jesus through a bullhorn for two hours a day. Or the frustratingly polite Hare Krishnas. Or the Asian man with the camera, who spent the day shouting, "You face on a button! Two dollah!" Salt of the earth, man.

      "You ever see the blind guy?" Al said. "He's got a music organ, too. Sings beautiful. Hymns and stuff. He must make fifty bucks a day."

      "I think you've got a ways to go before you're in his league, Al."

      Al shrugged and twisted his cap from side to side. "Maybe. But I'm gonna keep practicing."

      Joey dug into his pocket and pitched another quarter into the bowl. "You do that, Al. Catch you later."

      "Yeah, hey, I will. Thanks a lot."

      Joey picked his way through the noon crowd, dodging the nine-to-fivers carrying their take-out meals, stepping around the barefoot shamblers who waved their arms wildly and conversed with God and all His angels. His stomach grumbled, and he looked longingly at the steaming chop suey on display in Fu Wang's window. No. He'd miss the beginning of the movie.

      Joey wished he'd got up in time to have some breakfast. He wasn't used to rising before noon. Only things like the area premiere of I Dance on Your Coffin could coax him out of bed at such an early hour.

      It was, however, a beautiful October day, and it felt good to be out in the sunshine. Joey was almost sorry that he would be spending the afternoon in a darkened theater.

      Walter Johnson manned the Opal's ticket window. Blinking his red, rabbity eyes, he said, "Hey, dude, how's it going? Haven't seen you in a while."

      "Hi, Walter. One ticket."

      Walter had his hand in a bag of Cheese Doodles. He crammed a clump of the snacks into his mouth, then licked the fluorescent orange powder from his fingertips. "Wazzat?"

      Joey shook his head. "Jesus, Walter, what do you do? Take a bong hit as soon as you roll out of bed?"

      "Not every day," Walter said, visibly hurt.

      Joey waved a five-dollar bill at him. "A ticket. For the movie."

      "All right, already." Walter punched up a green piece of pasteboard, ripped it in half, and took Joey's money.

      "You're really going to like this one, Joey. Wait'll you see the part where the maniac forces a kid to eat a submarine sandwich made out of slices of his own girlfriend."

      "Thanks for ruining the suspense, Walter."

      "Hey, c'mon. Everybody knows that scene. And there's plenty of other good stuff."

      "I'm sure." Walter reached for another handful of Doodles, and Joey rapped on the booth window. "Hey, Walter, aren't you forgetting something?"

      "I gave you your ticket."

      "It's before five. Admission is three-fifty. I've got change coming, man."

      Walter attempted a sheepish grin. "Oh, right. Here you go." He slid Joey two quarters and a grungy bill.

      Inside the theater lobby, Joey asked the heavy-set girl behind the refreshment counter, "Hey, Christine, has the movie started yet?"

      "Another five. There's only about ten people in there. Want something to eat?"

      Joey peered through the smudged glass of the candy counter. "Let's see. How about a box of red Twizzlers, some Jordan Almonds, a large Sprite and a corn dog?"

      "What about popcorn?"

      "Right. Need something from each of the five basic food groups. A medium popcorn. Hold the rancid grease."

      Precariously clutching his purchases, Joey made his way to the auditorium doors and butted one open with his hip. As promised, the movie had not started yet. Joey plopped into a seat about a quarter of the way down the left aisle. He set the popcorn and the soft drink on the floor, placed the boxes of candy on his lap, and began eating the hot dog.

      The Opal could accommodate five hundred patrons, but this afternoon it held less than a dozen. Two teenaged boys talked loudly and punched each other on the arm repeatedly. Down by the fire exit, an obese man in a grimy green tee-shirt read the day's Chronicle, picking his nose while scanning the sports pages.

      An old black man trudged up and down the aisle, muttering to himself, unable to choose among the multitude of seats. A businessman with a gray suit and a pimp's mustache jealously guarded his briefcase, holding it on his lap and just daring anyone to come and take it from him. A skinny old lady with wild red hair cackled at a bon mot made by her companion, another harridan with no teeth and a floppy denim hat.

      Just as Joey was settled in, taking the first bite out of a Twizzler and thinking about the good advance word he'd heard about I Dance on Your Coffin, the Walkman entered and sat down three aisles in front of him.

      The blond giant wore his usual outfit. Levi's. Denim vest over a white tee-shirt. Black Converse hightops. Foldable Porsche sunglasses. And, of course, the portable cassette player earphones jammed onto his blockish head.

      The Walkman hunched down in his seat, draping his long legs over the chairs in front of him. He did not remove the sunglasses, despite the gloom of the theater. He didn't remove the earphones, either. He simply folded his massive arms across his well-muscled chest and stared straight ahead at the screen.

      Of all the freaks who roamed the fabled streets of San Francisco, Joey Spelvin considered the Walkman the spookiest.

      The lights dimmed and the moth-eaten curtain parted. Dancing ashtrays announced that no smoking was permitted. The two old women clapped their approval. One of the teenagers lit a joint.

      As I DANCE ON YOUR COFFIN appeared on the screen in blood-red letters, Joey suddenly wondered if there was a problem with the sound system. A tinny undercurrent of noise ran beneath the soundtrack. The Opal's management was far too cheap to invest in anything like Dolby Stereo, but usually the sound wasn't this bad.

      It took him a few minutes to identify the noise as music from the Walkman's cassette player. For Joey to be able to hear it from twenty feet away while demonic french horns blatted over the opening credits, the volume control on the machine had to be cranked to the max.

      The sound identified, Joey set out to ignore it. He watched the movie with growing interest and fumbled in his back pocket for his notebook and pen. Needing no more than the glare of the screen to see what he was doing, he scrawled in the notebook, "Directed by Lars Hoffnung. Starring Bibi McGee, Cliff Kent, Valerie Weiss and Vernon Grodak. Nocturnal excursion to aquarium. Bibi thrown to piranhas. Cliff buys it with electric eel. Killer wears diving suit & flippers."

      During lulls in the action, he found the whisper of the Walkman's tape machine intensely annoying. What kind of mushbrain pays good money for a movie and then sits through it wearing sunglasses and a tape player?

      For one insane instant, Joey considered asking him to turn down the noise. But no, that wouldn't do. The Walkman was not to be messed with, no matter how politely. Not with the way those muscles rippled and bulged beneath his pristine tee-shirt. Not with the way his tanned face remained utterly without expression, never displaying so much as a twitch. The guy might have the mental capacity of a lump of bread mold, but Joey was certain the Walkman could express himself quite eloquently with his fists.

      An old woman screamed, and the fat man down front yelled, "All right!" Someone on screen had just been dispatched with a harpoon. Angry he had missed one of the good parts, Joey returned his attention to the film.

      Ninety minutes later, I Dance on Your Coffin ended, and the lights came up. Joey blinked and rubbed his eyes. Most of the audience were already shuffling out. The old black man stayed behind, snoring loudly.

      The Walkman sat in his seat, bolt upright, still watching the vacant screen.

      Joey wandered out to the lobby, his joints popping. He squinted at the bright sunlight pouring through the glass front and groped his way toward the refreshment stand.

      Christine set down her well-thumbed paperback novel and smiled at him. "How'd you like it, Joey?"

      "Not bad at all. Not as good as The Power Drill Slaughter , but a respectable job nonetheless."

      Christine shuddered. "I don't know how you watch those things. They make me want to puke."

      "Different strokes," Joey said. "Hey, how about a box of those malted milk ball things?"

      Christine handed over the malted milk ball things. Paying for them, Joey said, "Umm, will anybody squawk if I sit through the next show?"

      "Nah," Christine said. "I won't tell anyone."

      "Great. I like to see movies twice before I review them. I think this one's going to get three stars."

      The Walkman strode out of the theater and across the lobby. As he walked, he removed his tape player from his pocket, flipped the cassette and started a fresh selection. He left the building.

      Christine said, "You still publishing that magazine?"

      "But of course. Next month, The Splatter Times marks its tenth issue anniversary. It's got an interview with Herschell Gordon Lewis, reviews of Dead Before Dawn , The Shambling Horror and Don't Look in the Closet , plus a special photo spread. It's going to be the Cahiers du Cinema of the slice-and-dice set."

      Christine regarded him with incomprehension. "I don't know, Joey. I think you watch too many movies."

      "But I'm selective. I pick one genre and stick to it. Hell, that's not just selectivity. That's integrity."

      Pointing behind him, Christine said to Joey, "Better be careful you don't wind up like that."

      Joey turned and saw the Walkman outside the ticket window, back for another go-round.

      "Who is that guy?"

      Christine pushed a strand of blond hair away from her eyes. "We haven't been formally introduced. And I don't want to be."

      "Does he come here often?"

      "He's our best customer. He's here every day."

      "Every day?"

      "For at least the first two shows. He started showing up about a month ago."

      What reason could anyone possibly have for sitting through the same film day after day? Joey recognized that he spent a good chunk of his life in the world of movie make-believe, but unless he was writing a review, he rarely saw any film more than twice.

      Joey said, "I'll cop to a little obsessive behavior, but that maniac is flat-out fucked-up."

      They watched Walter take the Walkman's money, tear the ticket in half, and hand the stub to the giant.

      "Does he pay for every show?"

      "Always. We usually don't hassle people who stick around, but he always insists on paying."

      "So it's not like he's some derelict looking for a place to sleep off a drunk?"

      "The guy pays with twenty dollar bills. Walter always short-changes him. So far, the guy hasn't noticed."

      "Lucky for Walter."

      A skinhead with a huge skateboard clutched under one tattooed arm banged a quarter against the countertop and snarled, "Hey, howzabout a large popcorn, huh?"

      "I'd better be going, Christine," Joey said. "Thanks for letting me hang around."

      In the Opal's lavatory, Joey took a moment to relieve his aching bladder. He was in midstream when the door swung open and someone entered. An almost subauditory buzz, like the drone of a stoned bumblebee, filled the air.

      Unless he wanted to risk a hernia, Joey couldn't stop what he was doing. He pretended to ignore the Walkman as the giant strode to the adjoining urinal.

      The Walkman did not unzip his fly. He merely stood there, looking at Joey through his mirrored shades, like some sort of New Wave storm trooper.

      Oh, Christ, thought Joey. Now what?

      Joey finished his business, zipped up, flushed. He turned to leave. To hell with washing his hands.

      The Walkman grabbed him by the shoulder. His grip was not particularly painful, but it was decidedly firm. It stopped Joey dead in his tracks.

      Joey looked up into the Walkman's stony face, trying to see behind the sunglasses, hoping to find something even vaguely human there.

      The Walkman stretched his lips into something resembling a smile. Joey noticed that one of his front teeth was grossly discolored, tinted a creepy purple, as if it were rotting from the inside.

      "Come in or go out?" said the Walkman.

      Joey felt as if someone had cinched a garden hose around his middle. "What are you talking about? What do you want, man?"

      The Walkman said, "It's OK. You don't have to decide now."

      He let Joey go. "But you will soon."

      The Walkman exited the men's room, marching to the sound of his own private music.