Heh. You think?

“Got a rocket,” I sang, “in your pocket. Turn off the juice, boy.”

Show tunes? Really? It wasn’t bad enough that you’ve started talking to yourself, man. Now you’re doing performing art.

But the musically inclined me had a point.

“Play it cool, boy,” I whispered. “Real cool.”

I approached the Big Hoods’ lair obliquely and cautiously. One might even accuse me of being overly cautious. I circled the lair from all angles, including up above, in a slow, spiral-shaped pattern that only gradually drew closer. I held a veil over myself the entire time, too. It wasn’t any easier as a ghost than it had been in the flesh, and I still couldn’t throw the greatest veil in the world, but I managed to make myself if not invisible, at least difficult to see.

I wasn’t there to fight. I was there to learn. Mort needed my help, but maybe the best way to give it to him wasn’t to go charging in like a rogue rhinoceros. Knowledge is power. I needed all the power I could get if I was going to help Morty.

The problem was that the Grey Ghost had apparently marshaled supporters of both the spirit and the flesh—and I couldn’t fight the damned crazy thugs who just happened to be made of solid matter. I’d need help. Maybe I could hop into Morty again and toss out enough power to let him run away—but that assumed Morty would let me step in at all. He sure as hell didn’t seem to like it the first time. It also assumed that he would be free and able to physically escape, and that I could neutralize his material captors. There was no guarantee either of those things would be the case.

I thought that the tip from Nick was a good one. I think he had identified the right bunch of yahoos, and I had faith in his knowledge of Chicago streets. After a lifetime walking them—and surviving—Nick was an expert. Chicago PD’s gang unit sometimes went to him for advice. Sometimes he even gave it to them.

But any expert could be wrong. If the Grey Ghost was wily enough to have a hideout separate from its material mooks’ living quarters and had stashed Mort there, I was about to waste a whole lot of time. But how would it get a setup of its own without physical help to establish it? If it was strong enough, I supposed, it could have a demesne of its own in the Nevernever—the spirit world. I’d dealt with a ghost named Agatha Hagglethorn once, and she’d had her own little pocket dimension filled with a Victorian-era copy of Chicago.

(It burned down.)

(I was not responsible.)

Anyway, I had to wonder if the Grey Ghost didn’t have a similar resource. It would make one fine hidey-hole to avoid annoying things like sunrise, daylight, and recently deceased wizards.

I paused for a moment to consider a notion. I wondered if I could establish a demesne of my own. I mean, theoretically, I knew how it would work. Granted, there’s as much space between theory and practice in magic as there is in physics, but it isn’t an unbridgeable gap. I was reasonably sure that it could be done. Maybe I could get Butters to let me talk shop with Bob for a few minutes. He’d know what I needed to make it happen, I was sure.