Dark Rivers of the Heart

the side street, rounded the corner, and hunched his shoulders against the chilly air.
        Judging by the liquid sounds of the night, the coast and all the works of civilization that stood upon it might have been merely ramparts of ice melting into the black Pacific maw. Rain drizzled off the awning, gurgled in gutters, and splashed beneath the tires of passing cars. At the threshold of audibility, more sensed than heard, the ceaseless rumble of surf announced the steady erosion of beaches and bluffs.
        As Spencer was passing the boarded-up art gallery, someone spoke from the shadows in the deeply recessed entrance. The voice was as dry as the night was damp, hoarse and grating: "I know what you are."
        Halting, Spencer squinted into the gloom. A man sat in the entryway, legs splayed, back against the gallery door. Unwashed and unbarbered, he seemed less a man than a heap of black rags saturated with so much organic filth that malignant life had arisen in it by spontaneous generation.
        "I know what you are," the vagrant repeated softly but clearly.
        A miasma of body odor and urine and the fumes of cheap wine rose out of the door-way.
        The number of shambling, drug-addicted, psychotic denizens of the streets had increased steadily since the late seventies, when most of the mentally ill had been freed from sanitariums in the name of civil liberties and compassion. They roamed America's cities, championed by politicians but untended, an army of the living dead.
        The penetrating whisper was as desiccated and eerie as the voice of a reanimated mummy. "I know what you are."
        The prudent response was to keep moving.
        The paleness of the vagrant's face, above the beard and below the tangled hair, became dimly visible in the gloom. His sunken eyes were as bottomless as abandoned wells. "I know what you are."
        "Nobody knows," Spencer said.
        Sliding the fingertips of his right hand along his scar, he walked past the shuttered gallery and the ruined man.
        "Nobody knows," whispered the vagrant. Perhaps his commentary on passersby, which at first had seemed eerily perceptive, even Portentous, was nothing more than mindless repetition of the last thing he had heard from the most recent scornful citizen to reply to him.
        "Nobody knows." Spencer stopped in front of the cocktail lounge. Was he making a dreadful mistake? He hesitated with his hand on the red door.
        Once more the hobo spoke from the shadows. Through the sizzle of the rain, his admonition now had the haunting quality of a static-shredded voice on the radio, speaking from a distant station in some far corner of the world. "Nobody knows…"
        Spencer opened the red door and went inside.
        On a Wednesday night, no host was at the reservations podium in the vestibule. Maybe there wasn't a front man on Fridays and Saturdays, either. The joint wasn't exactly jumping.
        The warm air was stale and filigreed with blue cigarette smoke.
        In the far left corner of the rectangular main room, a piano player under a spotlight worked through a spiritless rendition of "Tangerine."
        Decorated in black and gray and polished steel, with mirrored walls, with Art Deco fixtures that cast overlapping rings of moody sapphire-blue light on the ceiling, the lounge once had recaptured a lost age with style.
        Now the upholstery was scuffed, the mirrors streaked. The steel was dull under a residue of old smoke.
        Most tables were empty. A few older couples sat near the piano.
        Spencer went to the bar, which was to the right, and settled on the stool at the end, as far from the musician as he could get.
        The bartender had thinning hair, a sallow complexion, and watery gray eyes. His practiced politeness and pale smile couldn't conceal his boredom. He hinctioned with robotic efficiency and detachment, discouraging conversation by never making eye contact.
        Two fiftylsh men in suits sat farther along the bar, each alone, each frowning at his drink. Their shirt collars were unbuttoned, ties askew.
        'They looked dazed, glum, as if they were advertising-agency executives who had been pink-slipped ten years ago but still got up every morning and dressed for success because they didn't know what else to do: Maybe they came to The Red Door because it had been where they'd unwound after work, in the days when they'd still