The stranger turned his attention back to the miscreants. “The real question I have is ‘What am I going to do with you?’ Let you go to continue with your pathetic attempts at mayhem—”

“Yes. You should do that,” said Leviathan.

“Or do I drop the whole park into a fault line? Or just you two? I don’t imagine those bodies you’re stuck in would react well to magma.”

“Please don’t,” said Beelzebub. “We’ll be in so much trouble.”

“Plus, it would hurt a lot,” said Leviathan.

“Help me and I’ll let you go,” said the stranger. “You know what I want.”

Leviathan and Beelzebub pointed in different directions and talked at the same time.

“We just saw him . . .”

“The other day . . .”

“He didn’t look so good . . .”

“But Qaphsiel was closing in on the box.”

“Stop,” said the stranger. “The box?”

“Yes,” said Beelzebub. “He knew sort of where it was.”

“Sort of?”

“Yes. He was still looking, but was certain he was going to find it.”

“Finally,” said Leviathan, chuckling. “What a boob, right?” When the stranger didn’t chuckle back he stopped abruptly.

“Did he say this to you directly?”

Leviathan and Beelzebub looked away.

“No,” said Beelzebub. “We more or less inferred.”

“Body language and all that,” said Leviathan.

“Psychology.”

“But he didn’t actually tell you that he knew where the box was?”

“No,” said Leviathan. “But he had the map and was studying some buildings on it.”

“And he was more manic than usual,” said Beelzebub. “Believe me. We’ve been keeping an eye on him and he was excited about something.”

“Where is he now?”

“Um . . .” said Leviathan.

“Yeah,” said Beelzebub. “As the mortals say, we kind of dropped the ball on that.”

The stranger put his hand on Leviathan’s shoulder and squeezed. Bones cracked. “You lost him?”

Leviathan spoke through very large, pointed, gritted teeth. “There was a Christian publishing convention in town. So many souls to tempt and corrupt.”

“What he’s saying is that we got a little distracted,” said Beelzebub.

The stranger let go. Leviathan grimaced and shook the broken bones in his shoulder back into place. “Ow.”

“All right. Listen to me,” said the stranger. “You find Qaphsiel. If he has the box, let me know. If he’s close to the box, let me know. But don’t get involved with getting the box yourselves. That’s his task. Let him do it.”

“Of course,” said Leviathan.

“We’d be delighted,” said Beelzebub.

“Now get out of my sight,” said the stranger.

Leviathan and Beelzebub transformed back into their attractive human forms and walked quickly down the hill.

“Thank you,” said Beelzebub.

“Yes. Thanks,” said Leviathan.

“We’re ever so grateful.”

“Really. We really appreciate—”

“Go!” bellowed the stranger.

The fallen angels ran down the hill, slipping and sliding in their expensive shoes, grabbing each other to keep themselves from falling. The stranger couldn’t deal with them anymore. With the stupidity of this world. He walked up the hill in the direction the old couple had taken.