Go to Brooklyn and look up at the traffic lights. You may see shoes thrown up there. People have been throwing shoes up to the sky since there were telegraph lines criss-crossing the entire street. Oh, I remember all right. People didn't throw their shoes away so lightly in those days. Not when a pair of shoes was a month's wages. People threw the shoes up to send messages. Ask a sorceror, they will tell you the secret meaning of the shoes. I will tell you. A pair of polished dress shoes near the pole means that Old Jack has come up from the pipe and seeks tribute. A pair of dirty dress shoes means that Jack is gone. A pair of ballet slippers with white laces in the center of the bar means that a Thing is happening. If it's close to the light it means that a Moot is happening. If there's one slipper up there, it means that Central Park is hosting a big pow-wow. A pair of sneakers is just some dumb kid having fun. And if it's a pair of spray-painted hiking boots...something about the sidewalk trees. I have told you as much as I remember. Ask a sorceror for the rest if you have the coin to pay for it, else they make you an apprentice. I didn't raise your mother to let her children become sorcerors. There's more money to be made in medicine.

The animal skulls hanging from the lines, I know nothing about them. I have nothing to do with it. You think I would put up an omen like that? You think I have the money to buy an entire goat just so I could use its head to put the fear of God into the entire city? Hah!

 

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