before. His mind made foolish pictures to go with it.Of pigs laughing; of glass and barbed wire being groundbetween the teeth; of hoofed feet dancing on the door.As the noises grew so did his trepidation, but when hewent to the basement door to summon help it was locked;the key had gone. And now, as if matters weren't badenough, the light went out.

He began to fumble for a prayer -

'Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners nowand at the hour -'

But he stopped when a voice addressed him, quiteclearly.

'Michelmas,' it said.

It was unmistakably his mother. And there couldbe no doubt of its source, either. It came from thefurnace.

'Michelmas,' she demanded, 'are you going to let mecook in here?'

It wasn't possible, of course, that she was there in theflesh: she'd been dead thirteen long years. But somephantom, perhaps? He believed in phantoms. Indeedhe'd seen them on occasion, coming and going from thecinemas on 42nd Street, arm in arm.

'Open up, Michelmas,' his mother told him, in thatspecial voice she used when she had some treat for him.Like a good child, he approached the door. He had neverfelt such heat off the furnace as he felt now; he couldsmell the hairs on his arms wither.

'Open the door,' Mother said again. There was nodenying her. Despite the searing air, he reached tocomply.

'That fucking janitor,' said Harry, giving the sealed fireescape door a vengeful kick. 'This door's supposed to beleft unlocked at all times.' He pulled at the chains thatwere wrapped around the handles. 'We'll have to takethe stairs.'

There was a noise from back down the corridor; aroar in the heating system which made the antiquatedradiators rattle. At that moment, down in the basement,Michelmas Chaplin was obeying his mother, andopening the furnace door. A scream climbed frombelow as his face was blasted off. Then, the sound ofthe basement door being smashed open.

Harry looked at Valentin, his repugnance moment-arily forgotten.

'We shan't be taking the stairs,' the demon said.

Bellowings and chatterings and screechings werealready on the rise. Whatever had found birth in thebasement, it was precocious.

'We have to find something to break down the door,Valentin said, 'anything.'

Harry tried to think his way through the adjacentoffices, his mind's eye peeled for some tool that wouldmake an impression on either the fire door or thesubstantial chains which kept it closed. But there wasnothing useful: only typewriters and filing cabinets.

'Think, man,' said Valentin.

He ransacked his memory. Some heavy-duty instrument was required. A crowbar; a hammer. An axe!There was an agent called Shapiro on the floor below,who exclusively represented porno performers, one ofwhom had attempted to blow his balls off the monthbefore. She'd failed, but he'd boasted one day on thestairs that he had now purchased the biggest axe he couldfind, and would happily take the head off any client whoattempted an attack upon his person.

The commotion from below was simmering down.The hush was, in its way, more distressing than the dinthat had preceded it.

'We haven't got much time,' the demon said.

Harry left him at the chained door. 'Can you getSwann?' he said as he ran.

Til do my best.'

By the time Harry reached the top of the stairs thelast chatterings were dying away; as he began downthe flight they ceased altogether. There was no waynow to judge how close the enemy were. On the nextfloor? Round the next corner? He tried not to think ofthem, but his feverish imagination populated every dirtyshadow.

He reached the bottom of the flight without incident,however, and slunk along the darkened second-floorcorridor to Shapiro's office. Halfway to his destination,he heard a low hiss behind him. He looked over hisshoulder, his body itching to run. One of the radiators,heated beyond its limits, had sprung a leak. Steam wasescaping from its pipes, and hissing as it went. He lethis heart climb down out of his mouth, and then hurriedon to the door of Shapiro's office, praying that the manhadn't simply been shooting the breeze with his talk ofaxes. If so, they were done for. The office was locked,of course, but he elbowed the frosted glass out, andreached through to let himself in, fumbling for the lightswitch. The walls were plastered with photographs ofsex-goddesses. They scarcely claimed Harry's attention;his panic fed upon itself with every heartbeat he spenthere. Clumsily he scoured the office, turning furnitureover in his impatience. But there was no sign of Shapiro'saxe.

Now, another noise from below. It crept up thestaircase and along the corridor in search of him - anunearthly cacophony like the one he'd heard on 83rdStreet. It set his teeth on edge; the nerve of his rottingmolar began to throb afresh. What did the music signal?Their advance?

In desperation he crossed to Shapiro's desk to see ifthe man had any other item that might be pressed intoservice, and there tucked out of sight between desk andwall, he found the axe. He pulled it from hiding. AsShapiro had boasted, it was hefty, its weight the firstreassurance Harry had felt in too long. He returned tothe corridor. The steam from the fractured pipe hadthickened. Through its veils it was apparent that theconcert had taken on new fervour. The doleful wailingrose and fell, punctuated by some flaccid percussion.

He braved the cloud of steam and hurried to the stairs.As he put his foot on the bottom step the music seemed tocatch him by the back of the neck, and whisper: 'Listen'in his ear. He had no desire to listen; the music was vile.But somehow - while he was distracted by finding theaxe - it had wormed its way into his skull. It drained hislimbs of strength. In moments the axe began to seem animpossible burden.

'Come on down,' the music coaxed him, 'come on downand join the band.'

Though he tried to form the simple word 'No', themusic was gaining influence upon him with every noteplayed. He began to hear melodies in the caterwauling;long circuitous themes that made his blood sluggish andhis thoughts idiot. He knew there was no pleasure tobe had at the music's source - that it tempted himonly to pain and desolation - yet he could not shakeits delirium off. His feet began to move to the call ofthe pipers. He forgot Valentin, Swann and all ambitionfor escape, and instead began to descend the stairs.The melody became more intricate. He could hearvoices now, singing some charmless accompanimentin a language he didn't comprehend. From somewhereabove, he heard his name called, but he ignored thesummons. The music clutched him close, and now -as he descended the next flight of stairs - the musicianscame into view.

They were brighter than he had anticipated, andmore various. More baroque in their configurations(the manes, the multiple heads); more particular in theirdecoration (the suit of flayed faces; the rouged anus);and, his drugged eyes now stung to see, more atrociousin their choice of instruments. Such instruments! Byronwas there, his bones sucked clean and drilled withstops, his bladder and lungs teased through slashesin his body as reservoirs for the piper's breath. Hewas draped, inverted, across the musician's lap, andeven now was played upon - the sacs ballooning, thetongueless head giving out a wheezing note. Dorotheawas slumped beside him, no less transformed, the stringsof her gut made taut between her splinted legs like anobscene lyre; her breasts drummed upon. There wereother instruments too, men who had come off the streetand fallen prey to the band. Even Chaplin was there,much of his flesh burned away, his rib-cage played uponindifferently well.

'I didn't take you for a music lover,' Butterfield said,drawing upon a cigarette, and smiling in welcome. 'Putdown your axe and join us.'