Even Morley was puffing before we shook the pursuit. Staggering, I gasped, “It was torn already. And you’ve got another shirt. I’ve seen it.”
He didn’t respond. He was holding a wake for his apparel, though you could hardly tell there was a problem if he stayed tucked in.
I croaked, “Those guys’ve been working out.” My legs were rubber.
“Good thing you started before they did.” He wasn’t puffing nearly enough to suit me. I don’t know how he stays in shape. I’ve seldom seen him do anything more strenuous than chase women.
Maybe he just lucked out when he picked his ancestors.
“How about we take five?” We could afford it. I needed it. Before I puked up my toenails.
We had ended up dodging into one of those small sin sinks that cling to the skirts of the Hill and cater to and prey upon the idle rich. Nobody would help trace us there. Patrol folks weren’t welcome.
Morley and I planted our posteriors on a stoop where traffic seemed limited. Once I had sucked in enough air to rekindle my sense of humor, we began fantasizing scenarios wherein Winger did Winger sorts of things to find out what we were up to inside Maggie’s house—only with her suffering my kind of luck instead of her own.
You would have thought we were eleven again. We ended up with the giggles.
“Oh, damn!” I couldn’t stop laughing, despite the bad news. “Look who just showed up.”
The clumsy guy almost tripped over us before he realized that he had found us. His eyes got big. His face went pale. He gulped air. I gasped, “This clown has got to be psychic.”
“Want to grab him?”
The suspicion that we might try occurred to him first. He went high-stepping around a corner before we finished swatting the dust off the backs of our laps.
“Damn! Where did he go?”
“What I expected,” Morley said, suddenly morose as he stared down that empty cross street.
“Expected?”
“He’s a spook. Or a figment of your imagination.”
“No. He’s no ghost. He’s just lucky.”
“I’ve heard luck called a psychic talent.”
“Give me a break, Morley. How can random results have anything to do with talent?”
“Luck was really random it would even out, wouldn’t it?”
“I suppose.”
“So you ought to have some good luck once in a while, right? Unless you’re directing it somehow.”
“Wait a minute—” Our squabble wandered far afield. It kept us entertained all the way to the West End. For the heck of it, we set a couple of ambushes along the way. Our tail evaded both through sheer dumb luck. Morley did a lot of smirking.
I told him, “I’m about to come around to your way of thinking.”
“You say this Wixon and White place has a flimsy back door?”
“A bad joke. Unless it’s a trap.” There are spiders that specialize in catching other spiders.
“Show me. We’ll treat your friends to chills and thrills.”
Right. Morley was along just for the fun.
Wixon and White were open for trade. We lurked, watched a few customers come and go. “We’d better get on with it,” I said. “Their local watch is a little too serious for my taste.”
Morley grunted. I introduced him to the alley door. He scoped it out, suggested, “Give me ten minutes.”
“Ten? You going to take it out frame and all?”
“No, I was considering doing it quietly. You wanted fast you should have brought Saucerhead Tharpe. Finesse, Garrett. Surprise. I don’t do Thon-Gore the Learning Disabled.”
“Right.” I left the artist to his easel.
My old pal was hustling a personal agenda again. I had a good suspicion, too. And I didn’t care. I just wanted to get on with my job—the way I had defined it.
I wondered if I had an employer anymore. I hadn’t heard.
I waited in the breezeway while Morley did whatever. He did keep the racket down. I never heard a thing. No butternut thugs showed up to inconvenience us, either. I tried to psych myself into a role.
Time. I walked to the shop door and invited myself inside.
“Howdy.” I grinned. Wasn’t nobody there but them and me. I locked the door. I put the closed sign in the window.
One bold corsair demanded, “What are you doing?” He wanted to sound tough, but his voice scrambled right up into a high squeak.
The other one didn’t say anything. After ten seconds frozen like those mythical birds that stare down snakes, he bolted for the back room. A moment later, he squealed like Morley was whipping him with a naked woman.
I trotted out my cheerful charlie voice. If you do that right, it’s really sinister. “Howdy, Robin.” It had taken me a moment to sort them out. “We just dropped in to get the real skinny on Emerald Jenn.” I pasted on my salesman’s smile. Robin squeaked again and decided to catch up with Penny.
Both those fierce buccaneers were taller than Morley. They looked pretty silly being held by their collars from behind, facing me, when I entered their lumber room. They were shaking.
I closed the door. I barred it. I leaned back against it. I asked, “Well? Want to pick a spokesman?” The room was an extreme mess. I’m sure it was a wreck to start but now had the air of a place hastily tossed, perhaps by a dedicated bibliophile in quest of a rare first edition. “Come on, fellows.”
Heads shook.
“Let’s don’t be silly.”
Morley forced them to kneel. He hauled out a knife way too long to be legal. He made its blade sing on his whetstone.
“Guys, I want Emerald Jenn. Also known as Justina Jenn. You’re going to tell me what you know about her. You’ll feel better for it. Start by telling me how you met her.”
Wixon and White whimpered and whined and tried to exchange impassioned farewells. Boy, I was good. Oh, the drama. Morley did his bit by testing his edge on Penny’s mustache. A big hunk of lip hair tumbled to the floor. Morley went back to work with his whetstone.
“Don’t nobody need to get killed,” I said. “I thought I’d just skin one of you.” I toed that glob of hair.
“Immigrants,” Morley observed.
“Probably.” Karentines don’t rattle easily, having survived the Cantard. They would have made us work. “Talk to me, outlanders.”
Robin cracked. “It was almost a year ago.”
Penny glared.
“What was almost a year ago?”
“The first time the girl came to the shop. Looking lost. Looking for any handle.”
“Just wandered in? Wanting to borrow a cup of frog fur?”
“No. She was just looking. In more ways than one.”
“Uhm?”
“She was a lost soul, drowning in despair, looking for straws to grasp. There was a young man with her. Kewfer, I believe she called him. He was blond and beautiful and young and that was the only time he came around.”
“Sorry he broke your heart. Don’t go misty on me.”
Penny didn’t like Robin’s wistful tone, either, but he just kept the glare cooking.
“Kewfer?” I stressed it just as he had.
Thoughtfully, Morley suggested, “Quince Quefour?”
“Quince.” Left me thoughtful, too. Quincy Quentin Q. Quintillas was pretty enough to launch a thousand ships filled with fierce pirates. He was a small-time conman of the smallest time, too damned dumb to amount to anything. He was part elvish. Made him look younger than his real years and got him out of army time. A faked spook thing would be right up Quefour’s alley.
I barely knew him, didn’t want to know him better. I described him.
Robin nodded vigorously, eager to please. I wondered if he was just telling me what he thought I wanted to hear.
“Thank you, Robin. You see? We can get along fine. What was Quefour up to?”
Baffled look. “He wasn’t up to anything. He was just with the girl. Wasn’t much special about her, either.”
Of course not. You were lusting in your heart. “Please explain.”
“She wanted an easy answer. She was looking for easy answers.”
“I thought she was desperate.”
“Desperate after the fashion of her age. Kids want results without work. They believe they deserve magical answers. They don’t want to hear that real magic is hard work. Your stormwardens and firelords spend twenty years studying and practicing. These kids think you just wiggle your fingers . . . ”
Morley’s magic fingers darted, slapped Robin’s hand. Robin had started wiggling fingers as if by way of demonstration. He might have suckered us had we not been in the back of a shop that supplied witches and warlocks.
“Stick to Emerald Jenn. I develop a taste for social commentary, I’ll head for the front steps of the Chancery.” The most marvelous lunatics hold forth there. “Emerald, Robin. Quefour didn’t come back but she did. Talk to me.”
“You don’t need to be brutal. Emmy was a runaway. Came from upcountry. We knew that but not much more till a few weeks ago.”
“A runaway,” I repeated, trying to put an evil twist on everything I said. Morley rolled his eyes. “On her own here for a year.” Scary idea. A girl can live a lifetime in a year on the streets of TunFaire. “What did she run from?”
“Her mother.”
Who had been worried because her baby had been missing six days. “Go on.”
“She didn’t go into detail, but it was obvious the woman was a horror.”
“Emerald spend a lot of time here?”
“She helped out. Sometimes she stayed back here.” Gesture toward a ratty pallet. I didn’t apologize for what I had thought about that. “She was a wounded bird. We gave her a place to feel safe.” Hint of defiance.
I could see a girl feeling safer with Penny and Robin than on the street. Trouble was, I had trouble accepting them as philanthropists. Too cynical am I.
Robin was a real chatterbox when he loosened up. I spent a lot of energy guiding him back to the main path.
“Seen her lately?”
“No. She heard her mother had come to town.”
“That would make her stay away?”
“She thought her mother would look for her. And she is looking, right? You’re here. She doesn’t want to be found. People who don’t know where she is can’t give her away.”
Morley and I exchanged glances. “What’s she scared of?”
Robin and Penny got into the look-trading business. A growth industry. Only they were puzzled.
“You don’t know.” My intuition was at work. “She told a tale but you didn’t buy it. Think you know her? She the kind to fill you up and leave you to feed the wolves?”
“What?”
“She knows her mother. She’d know what kind of people would be sent.”
More looks flashing. The ferocious pirates of this world are paranoid. Given our record, they are justified in expecting evil of the rest of us.
Penny had spent the interview glowering at Robin. He seemed to suffer a sudden pessimistic epiphany. He barked, “Marengo North English.”
“What?” Tell me I heard wrong.
“Marengo North English.”
I heard right. But why did he have to say that? Things had been crazy enough. I feigned ignorance. “What’s that?”
Robin tittered. “That’s a who. One of our biggest customers. A very powerful underground adept.”
That was disheartening news, but useful if ever I found myself dealing with the lunatic fringe.
Penny said, “He met Emmy here. Invited her into his coven. She went a few times but didn’t like the people or what they wanted to do.”
Robin said, “We thought she might have run to him.”
I stipulated, “He could protect her.” Morley looked at me askance. I said, “I’ve met the man. I didn’t know he dabbled in black magic, though.” North English mostly concentrated on virulent racism.
Penny and Robin seemed surprised, as though they had not heard of Marengo North English in any but an occult context. Silly boys. The man had a special place in his heart for their sort, too.
Morley moved sudden as heat lightning, startling us all. He ripped the alley door open, stepped out, stared for a moment, shook his head, and closed up. “Guess who?”
“Some guy who tripped over his own feet getting away.”
“You win first prize. Near time to go.”
“I have a few more questions.”
“That guy is a lightning rod for the law.”
Right. And I didn’t accomplish much more, though I had hoped to get at their angle for helping Emerald. I did get the names of three people who were on speaking terms with the girl. Not real friends. Not people likely to be useful. Emerald evidently didn’t have any friends.
We departed as suddenly as we had arrived. We were gone before those bold buccaneers knew we were going. We were out of the West End moments later. We were long gone before the boys in butternut closed in.
Miles from the West End, we ducked into a smoky dive frequented by the lowest classes. The bar was wide planks on sawhorses. The fare consisted of bad red sausages and worse green beer. Nobody paid me any mind, but Morley drew some vaguely hostile looks. Nobody would recognize him if he stayed a year, though. You don’t look for Morley Dotes in that kind of place.
Morley settled opposite me at a scarred trestle table and steepled his fingers. “We have some names.”
“Five. And none worth the paper it’s written on.”
“You reacted to one.”
“Marengo North English. I don’t know why the black magic connection surprised me. The man has the brain of a snake.”
“You met him? Tell me about him.”
“He’s a loony. A racist loony. The Call. Sword of Righteousness. He wouldn’t be involved in this. He would have cut Emerald off the second he heard about Maggie and the Rainmaker. Not our kind, you know, old bean.”
“Wasn’t what I meant. I think.”
“He’s the Call.”
Not many patrons found themselves in circumstances sufficiently insufficient to have to take their custom into that dump, but those that did were curious. Ears pricked up and twitched first time I mentioned the Call. Second time, various faces turned toward us.
This was the sort of place where the Call would find recruits for the Sword of Righteousness, the sort of place infested by folks who’d never once in life had a bad break that was their own fault.
Morley caught the significance of my glare. “I see.”
In a softer voice, I said, “He was a founding father of the Call. I met him at Weider’s estate. I was doing security. Weider mentioned my military background. He tried to recruit me into the Sword of Righteousness. Sicking him on me was Weider’s idea of a joke.”
Party police isn’t my usual, but Old Man Weider had asked nice and he’s had me on retainer so long we’re practically business partners. I said, “Be afraid of Marengo North English. He’s crazy as hell, but he’s the real thing. Had me ready to puke in his pocket two minutes after he started his spiel.”
“But you didn’t.”
“Of course not. That was Weider’s place. He was Weider’s guest.” The brewery retainer keeps me going through the hard times. “Like me, Weider can’t help it if he has to do business with crazies.”
“You didn’t sign on with the Sword?”
“Give me a break. I grunted and nodded and got away from the man. The way you do when you don’t want to make a scene. Why’re you so interested?”
“Because I know Marengo North English, too. That man is going to be trouble. Why don’t you sign up? Give sanity an agent inside.”
I hemmed and hawed and cast meaningful looks at the big-eared clientele. I waved for another pint.
Morley got it. “Something to think over. We can talk about it later. Meantime, I think you’re right. He might have seen a chance at some sweet young stuff, but he wouldn’t keep her around ten seconds after he found out she had a scandal in her background.”
I must have had a funny look on. He added, “I get to meet all kinds.” I presume he had done some work for North English. I didn’t ask.
“Where are you going from here, Garrett?”
“I was thinking Quefour. Not that he’ll know anything.”
“I need to get back to the store.”
“Got to read that book?”
“Book?” He started out with a hard look, decided on a different tack. “Wasn’t a book. It was gone already.” He grinned. Beat me to death with honesty.
“I’m heartbroken for you.” I tossed coins onto the table. The tavernkeeper made them vanish before they stopped rattling. “Thanks for your help.”
“Hey, it was fun. Anytime. I have some advice for you, though.”
“I can’t wait.”
“There’s a chance black magic is involved. You should take precautions.”
“I’m a certified genius. I was thinking that very thought.” Really. Because I was getting uncomfortable about how easy it was for one inept gorilla to keep getting back on my tail.
I knew I would see him as soon as we stepped into the street. And he didn’t disappoint me.
Handsome’s alley was back where it belonged. I examined it as I ambled past, not wanting to lead trouble to the house of a friend. Neither did I want to make a fool of myself by stepping into something unpleasant.
Second time past I turned in, leaving the inept guy trying to blend into a mob of dwarves. What worried me was that my other fans might realize they could stay on me by keeping track of him.
The trash had deepened. It was deeper everywhere. Such was the nature of things.
The shop felt unnaturally quiet—though how that was possible I couldn’t say. It never got rowdy. Maybe it was like the breathing of the mice and roaches was absent.
Handsome’s ragged cat padded in, sat, fixed me with a rheumy stare. I wondered how bad its eyes were. I didn’t move around. I killed time watching from inside while my eyes adjusted. No point finding out how Handsome protected herself.
Then she was there. For one moment, I lapsed into a daydream and suddenly I wasn’t alone.
Spooky.
She looked me in the eye. “You grew up with some sense after all.”
“Only a fool goes around touching stuff in a place like this.”
“Not what I meant, boy. You learned better than that when you was a pup. I’m talking about you having sense enough to know you’re in over your head.”
I did? I was? I nodded. I never shatter illusions.
“Garrett men just bull ahead, confident they can handle anything.”
That was me, sort of. Except the part about the confidence.
“Explains how you managed to come home when they didn’t.”
Mystified, I let her talk. Patience is a sound strategy when you don’t know what is going on. When she did slacken, I wedged in, “Wixon and White did know the girl. But it looks like Grange Cleaver faked up the black magic connection.” I related the details of my adventures as I would have done for the Dead Man.
Handsome let me run dry. She let me stand empty a while, too. Then, “Why would the Rainmaker want to find the girl?”
“I don’t have a clue. Maybe her mother is dead and he needs Emerald to control the estate.”
“She is valuable or dangerous. One or the other.”
“Or both.”
“You’ll have to find her to know which. Can you?”
“Given time.”
“You’ve made enemies. And you let someone mark you with a finding spell.”
“I was afraid of that. The stumblebum?”
“He’s tracking you. He didn’t mark you.”
“Winger or Maggie, then.”
“And the Jenn woman seems to be the Rainmaker in drag.”
“Who wants me sleeping with the fishes.”
“And who wouldn’t be above using a dollop of sorcery to get his way.”
“No way can this klutz be Cleaver’s. Whenever I sit still long enough to draw a crowd, I accumulate one of Cleaver’s own kind. So who could the guy work for?”
“Am I a mind reader? You want that, go home.”
“Why did Cleaver get after me in the first place? I just can’t figure that.”
“At this point, why don’t matter. He is. Deal with that.”
I moved slightly. Just a twitch of impatience, really. But the old cat hissed.
“Patience, boy. And caution. These days a hundred evils could jump you before you got a hundred paces from this shop.”
“I know.” That was why I was there.
She told me, “I’m not going to let you go back out there till you’re better prepared.”
Who, me argue? “Thank you. That was in the back of my mind.”
“I know.”
“I’d be eternally grateful for any help.”
“Don’t heap it on with a manure fork, boy. It’s all part of putting the Rainmaker in his place.”
She knew the rules. Never let on how much you care. If you care, you’re vulnerable.
The cat hissed again.
“What? I didn’t do anything.”
“Never mind Malkyn. She can smell the trouble on you. She worries about me.”
Malkyn. Of course. What the hell else? “I smell the trouble on me, too. It’s a curse.”
“Or a calling.” Her right eyebrow rose. Excellent! There was one talent I hadn’t known she commanded.
“No. I just wish I could wash it off. I don’t want to get into all these crazy things. I’d rather sit around the house drinking beer and—”
“You’re bullshitting an old bullshitter, boy. I know more about you than you think.”
My cue to hoist a brow.
“That don’t slice no ice.” She started moving around, fiddling, muttering. I realized she was naming names. “Hey! Wait a minute! What do they have to do with anything?”
“You wouldn’t have met one of those ladies if you’d stayed holed up. And you ain’t going to meet no more—”
“All right!” Truth is pain. Female remains my great weakness. A flashy smile and saucy wink can lure me away from safety.
Grinning evilly, Handsome cleared nonhuman skulls off a fern stand, started assembling her candidates for weirdest items in the shop. I started to say something but didn’t get past opening my mouth.
“Give me that stick, boy.”
I surrendered my headknocker, then opened my flycatcher again.
She didn’t give me a chance to speak. “We don’t got no idea what you’re gonna run into, so what I’m gonna do is give you a range of generic defenses.”
Oh, that sounded good. If it meant anything. “What are you doing to my stick?”
“Toughening it up, boy. When I get done with it, you’re going to be able to whack right through all the common protective spells. You see that red thing there?”
“Looks like a dried-out sow’s ear somebody dyed red?”
“The very thing. It looks like a sow’s ear on account of once upon a time somebody hacked it off the side of a pig’s head. I want you should take it and put it in your right front pocket. And keep it there until you settle up with the Rainmaker.”
“Why?” She was getting ahead of me.
“On account of the Rainmaker is the kind who would get a laugh out of fixing you so’s you wouldn’t have no more reason to leave your house looking for women.”
Ouch! I needed only about a quarter-second to mull things over. I accepted the sow’s ear, placed it as directed. “You’re the expert.” Some fates are too horrible to contemplate.
“Remember it.” She aligned four more objects, then regrouped them. One was a small wooden box given to fits of angry buzzing. Whatever was in there sounded huge for a bug.
Handsome noted my interest. “It’s more wicked than it sounds.”
“I wanted to hear that.”
“It’s not gonna bother you, son. Once I tell it you’re its friend.”
“Oh, hey, by all means. I’m a bug-lover from way back. I probably met most of its family when I was in the islands. I got intimate with lots of bugs when I was down there.”
“You always did have a tongue of nonsense, boy.”
What the hell did that mean?
She continued, “You don’t want to use the little devil, don’t bother. What they call a last resort. When you and your tongue have gotten you into something where there ain’t no weaseling out, just pop that lid open.”
“Yeah?” Call me dubious. I stopped being a bug booster during my Marine days. “Then what? It bites a hunk out of me and I scare the bad guys away with my screams?”
“Maybe. Or maybe it just comes home and tells me you need help.”
Somehow having a bug in a box didn’t sound that useful if I was in it deep, but Mom Garrett never raised her boys to backtalk the likes of Handsome. She always said we should keep our yaps shut when we were around somebody who could turn us into table scraps. There were times when Mom was pretty astute. “Uhm,” I grunted.
Handsome gave me the fish-eye, then resumed her explanations. I did listen. And found my imagination captivated immediately.
Handsome offered me a doodad that looked like a wood chip stained red on one side and green on the other. She told me, “When you want you should turn invisible to that guy following you, you should rub your thumb three times across the red side here. He shouldn’t ought to turn suspicious because the spell he’s using isn’t all that reliable. You think it would be handy having him tag along, you rub your thumb three times on the green side.”
“What? Why would I want him following me?”
“How would I know?” She shrugged. “Reckon that’s all I can do for you right now. Time you were getting along, anyway, boy. I’ve got paying customers backing up.”
Where? But I only thought it.
The old cat looked at me like she was thinking about taking a bite out of my ankle before I got away. Or like she thought she would take a bite, if only she had some teeth.
Handsome patted me down, making sure I was carrying everything exactly where she wanted me carrying it.
I kept at it. “What can you tell me about—”
“Go on, boy. Out of here. Shoo. Scoot. How do you kids expect me to get any work done if you pester me all day long?”
Had she gone senile all of a sudden? Or was she trying to make me nostalgic?
I treasured my childhood memories but didn’t consider those times the good old days. The good old days never were. These are the good old days, right here, right now.
Won’t never get no better than this.
I’d told Morley I would see Quefour while doubting there was any point. But brave soldier I, dedicated to my mission, I spent a half hour trying to trace that most useless of beings and learned that when last seen he had been floundering around with an inept homosexual murphy in the Tenderloin, which was a stupid game to play. The wise guys could help him take a swim with a hundred-pound rock strapped to his back.
The beauty of being your own supervisor is you set your own hours. If the spirit moves you, you can procrastinate till hunger boots you into action.
I headed for home thinking life couldn’t get any better.
Of course, it could have a Chastity Blaine perched on your front stoop when you came home, so damned radiant all your male neighbors had found some reason to come out and gawk.
She was alone. I broke into a trot, wove through the crowd, felt the deep disapproval radiating from such bastions as Mrs. Cardonlos’s rooming house. Chastity was the only woman in the neighborhood smiling when I puffed up. “Where’s Saucerhead?” I demanded.
“Saucerhead?” She really seemed puzzled.
“You know. Saucerhead Tharpe. Big goof with snaggle teeth. Your bodyguard. Able to outsmart small rocks if you give him an hour.”
She smiled grimly, not in the mood. “I let him go.”
“Why’d you do a fool thing like that?” What a sweet tongue.
“I don’t have to worry anymore. It seems the episode of the escaping patient who couldn’t have been in the first place because there’s no record of any admission tore it for me. The Knopfler Bledsoe Imperial Memorial Charity Hospital no longer welcomes my services.”
“They canned you. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. It was a learning experience.”
“Uhm?” Philosophy straight from the Dead Man.
“I discovered that bitter old cynics like my father are right. No good deed goes unpunished.”
“I like his thinking. So how come you’re here? Not that I’m complaining. I couldn’t have daydreamed a nicer surprise.” I was hungry. I couldn’t correct that hanging around on the stoop. I went to work with my key.
“I guess because you’re the only one who knows what’s going on.”
“Boy, don’t I wish.” The door was bolted on the inside. I let out a shriek that got everybody within two blocks looking my way. I pounded away. Nobody responded.
“Is anyone in there? I couldn’t get an answer.”
“They’d better be dead. If they’re not, I’m going to kill them. They’re drinking up my beer and eating up my food and now they won’t let me into my own house. I’m going to skin them and make myself a suit out of their hides.”
“What are you going on about?”
“How many escaped patients have they recovered?”
“Only a few. It’s not like they’re trying real hard.”
“A couple of them turned up here and I let them stay.” The Goddamn Parrot was in there hollering so loud I could hear him through the door. I put on eternity’s most forced smile. “You said it. No good deed goes unpunished.”
“They’re here now?”
“Somebody barred the door. If I have to break in, I’m going to carve somebody into rat snacks.”
“Aren’t you overreacting a little?”
Yes. “No!”
I received a completely unexpected hug. “Guess I’m not the only one who’s had a bad day.”
“Once we get in, let’s butcher one of the clowns and discuss our bad days while we eat him.”
“Don’t be so gruesome. Who are they?”
“Ivy and Slither.”
“Are you sure?”
“That’s the names they use. What they want to be called.” I pounded on the door and howled some more. “Soon to be past tense.” Across the street, Mrs. Cardonlos came to her window and gave me that look. I was going to get another protest from the citizen’s committee. How dare I raise hell on my own front stoop?
I sent Mrs. Cardonlos a smile. “Wait till I get my next psychopathic killer, lady. I’ll tell him you’re desperate to meet a real man.”
“You don’t have some secret way to get in?”
“You didn’t grow up in this neighborhood, did you? If I had a secret entrance, the villains would have used it to clean me out a long time ago.”
“You don’t expect me to apologize for where I grew up?”
Careful, Garrett. “You didn’t pick your parents. Just ignore me. I get testy when I can’t get into my own house.” I went to work on the door again.
The lady had begun to doubt the wisdom of being with me. I made a special effort to remain calm and reasonable when Ivy finally cracked the door an inch, keeping it on the chain while he checked me out.
“Ivy, it’s me. I’m home and I’d really like to visit my kitchen. Think you could speed it up?” I scanned the street quickly. Looked like everybody who’d shown any interest lately was out there watching. Even a guy with an eyepatch and an earring. I couldn’t see if he had a pegleg, but I knew where he could pick up a parrot cheap.
The door opened. There to greet me was Slither. “Doc Chaz. Garrett. Sorry. I was in the kitchen whipping something up. I thought Ivy was taking care here.” Ivy was at the door to the small front room, looking inside with eyes that had glazed over. “Looks like he’s having one of his spells.”
“I’m about to have one of mine.”
“Bad day?”
“That catches the spirit of it.” Slither wasn’t listening. He was headed for the kitchen.
Chastity asked, “These men escaped with you?”
“Not with me. But they were both in my ward.”
“I know Rick Gram.” She indicated Ivy. “The other one is a stranger.”
“Slither claims he got in there the same way I did. And the same guy put him there.”
“Grange Cleaver?”
“The very one.”
“Maybe. I don’t recognize him. But there were four hundred men in your ward. And I was expected to concentrate on the female population.”
We hit the kitchen. Slither announced, “Not a lot of supplies left here, Garrett. You need to do some shopping.”
Scowling, I put an arm around Chastity’s shoulder and headed for the back door. I didn’t want to be home after all. With the thumb of my free hand I stroked the red side of a wood chip. “I’m ducking out the back way, Slither. The front door ever gets barred again I’m going to cut somebody’s heart out. You make sure Ivy understands.” Intuition told me that was all Ivy. He been Long Range Recon once upon a time, but he was afraid of his own shadow now. “My house, Slither. My rules and my ways.”
“Stay cool, Garrett. I got it under control. You and Doc Chaz go somewhere, have a good time.”
“I hope every villain in town is camped out in front of my place.” Chastity and I were enjoying a perfect evening. Nearly perfect. I had one bad moment at a place where I caught a glimpse of Maya Stuub. Once upon a time Maya had thought more of me than I’d thought of myself.
Maya didn’t see me. I put her out of mind and had a nice time.
Chastity was all right. I could relax with her. I told her tales of the Garrett that was, suitably edited for modern audiences, and she did the same with Chaz Blaine—though she didn’t say much about her family. We lost track of time. Time lost track of us. An apologetic fellow with a grungy towel on his arm advised us that it was time to close. We nodded and apologized back and left too much money and went out to wander streets we didn’t see. For both of us the world had come into narrow focus. We were our universe—that teenage feeling . . .
“My gods you’re beautiful,” I told her in a place that wasn’t mine. And she was. More than I had imagined.
Her insecurities burned through. She protested, “My nose is crooked and one eye is higher than the other and my mouth is tilted and one boob is bigger and higher than the other.”
“You got weird toes, too, but I don’t give a damn. You hear me howling about what a prize I am? Lucky you, not even having to find the end of the rainbow.”
“We’re all overstressed these days, aren’t we?”
“Absolutely.” Nobody anywhere was comfortable. Conflicts were feeding upon one another. “A moment that loosens us from the cycle of despair is a treasure.”
“Was that a compliment? I’m going to take it in that spirit.”
Actually, it was a quote from the Dead Man, but why disappoint the lady?
Got to be getting old. I woke up feeling guilty about not having done anything useful about Emerald Jenn. I watched Chaz sleep. I recalled Morley’s comment about her quality. I remembered seeing Maya. I felt a twinge of pain.
Chaz opened an eye, saw me looking, smiled, stretched. The sheet slipped off her. I gulped air, astounded all over again.
Next time I knew it was an hour later and I hadn’t heard a word from my might-have-beens the whole time.
“So what do you intend to do?” Chaz asked, having heard the details of the case.
“That’s my problem. Common sense says walk away. Tell myself some people tried to use me, I made some money, we’re even.”
“But part of you wants to know what’s going on. And part is worried about the girl.”
I admitted nothing.
“Waldo told me about the case he helped you with.”
Naturally. He wouldn’t have missed a chance to play his big It Was All My Fault scene. “Waldo?” They were on a first-name basis?
“Waldo Tharpe.”
“Saucerhead. Sometimes I forget he has a real name.”
“And your friend Morley told me about a case involving a girl named Maya and something called the Sisters of Doom.”
“He did?” That startled me.
“It’s pretty obvious, Garrett. You’re an idealist and a romantic. With big clay feet, maybe, but one of the last good guys.”
“Hey! Wait a minute. I’m turning red here. Anyway, there’s never been anybody more pragmatic than Mrs. Garrett’s little boy.”
“You can’t even convince yourself, hard boy. Go. Find Emmy Jenn. Help her if she needs it. I’m getting out of the way. You don’t need distractions.”
“That’s where we disagree.”
“Down, boy. When you’ve wrapped it up, send me a message at my father’s house. I’ll be knocking on your door before you can say Chastity is a naughty girl.”
“Uh-oh.” Not again.
“What?”
“Don’t get mad. I don’t know who your father is.”
“You didn’t investigate me?”
“I didn’t see a need.”
“My father is the Firelord Fox Direheart.”
Oh, boy. I made a squeaking noise.
“Can you remember?”
Squeak. I don’t dally with the daughters of sorcerer nobility. I don’t relish the honor of having my hide bind somebody’s grimoire.
“Don’t let the title intimidate you. He’s just old Fred Blaine at home.”
Right. What I’ve been looking for all my life, a girlfriend whose pop is a frontliner but wants me to slap his back and call him Fred.
“You’ll get in touch?”
“You know I will, devil woman.” I wouldn’t be able to resist.
“Then get back to your quest. I can find my way home.” Cute little frown. “And then Daddy will get in his ‘I told you so’ about the hospital job. I hate it when he’s right, because he’s always right about people being cruel and selfish and wicked.”
I collected a farewell kiss and headed for home wondering why one of Karenta’s leading sorcerers was here in TunFaire instead of working the cleanup detail down in the Cantard.
I slipped in the back door. Slither and Ivy were in the kitchen, one drunk and the other cooking. Slither said, “Yo, Garrett. The cupboard is bare.”
“Need a new keg, too,” Ivy slurred.
“Sing, Johnny One-Note,” I grumbled. If they didn’t like it, they ought to do something about it.
Up front, the Goddamn Parrot was squawking about neglect. I wondered if Slither had started eating parrot chow, too.
I wondered what the Dead Man would think if he woke to find himself in this zoo.
I said, “I guess that means it’s time you moved on to greener pastures.”
“Huh?”
“You done anything to find work? To find your own place? I think I’ve done my share.”
“Uh . . . ”
“He’s right,” Ivy said. His tongue tangled, but otherwise he was more articulate drunk than his sidekick was when he was sober. “We haven’t contributed here. It’s possible we’re not capable. And this is his home.”
Damn. The man made me feel guilty when all he was doing was telling the truth.
“I washed the goddamn dishes, Ivy. I did the laundry. I scrubbed woodwork. I even sprayed bugweed juice on the thing in the lib’ary to keep the crawlies off’n it. So don’t go saying I didn’t do nothing, Ivy. What the hell you keeping a mummy around for, Garrett? And if you got to, how come you got to keep such an ugly bugger?”
“He makes a great conversation piece. The girls all tell me how cute he is.”
That didn’t wake him up, either.
Slither wasn’t listening. “And how about you, Ivy? What’ve you done? Besides suck down that horse piss till you make me wonder where the hell you put it all? You hungry, Garrett?”
“Yes.”
“Sink your fangs into these here biscuits. Gravy coming up.” He wheeled on Ivy, but Ivy had gotten going, headed up front. I shut them out, ate hastily, wondered if they’d gotten married. Slither started hollering the length of the house.
“Enough!” I snapped. “Has anyone been around?”
“Shit, Garrett, you got to be the most popular guy in town. Always somebody pounding on your door.”
“And?”
“And what? You ignore them, they go away.”
“That’s always been my philosophy.”
Ivy stuck his head in. “There was that cute little girl.”
I raised an eyebrow, which was talent wasted on those two.
“Yeah,” Slither said. “Ivy answered that one. He’s a sucker for a skirt.”
Ivy shrugged, looked embarrassed.
“Well, guys?”
“I don’t know,” Ivy said. “I didn’t understand.” Hardly the first time, I thought. “She didn’t make much sense. Something about could you help her find her book yet.”
Find her book? “Linda Lee?”
“Huh?”
“She tell you her name? Was it Linda Lee?”
Ivy shrugged.
No good deed unpunished, Garrett. I downed a last bite, knocked back a mug of weak tea, headed for the front of the house. T.G. Parrot seemed less intolerable by the hour.
Everything is relative.
I used the peephole.
That was Macunado Street all right. Infested with quasi-intelligent life. Not much use studying it through a hole, though. I opened up and stepped onto the stoop.
I spotted nobody but sensed the watching eyes. I settled onto my top step, watched the sweep of commerce. As always, I wondered where everybody was going in such a hurry. I nodded at people I knew, mostly neighbors. Some responded. Some hoisted their noses and wished I would vanish in a puff of smoke. Old Mr. Stuckle, who roomed at the Cardonlos place, was one of the friendly ones. “How you doing, son?”
“Some good days, Pop. Some bad days. But every new day is a blessing.”
“I heard that. You got Gert stirred, you know.”
“Again? Or still?”
He grinned a grin with only two teeth left to support it. “There you go.” Gert Cardonlos always took the other side when my neighbors got upset. I wondered whether she had changed her name to Brittany or Misty, she would have grown old without growing sour.
Probably not.
As I watched Stuckle breast the stream of flesh a neighborhood urchin sidled up. “There’s people been watching your place.”
“No kidding?” Becky Frierka had illusions about getting involved in my adventures. I don’t mind having girls around, but they need to be a little older than eight. “Tell me about it.” You never know where you’ll learn something useful. And me listening would make Becky feel good.
I don’t remember my father much. Mom always said one of his philosophies was each day you should do at least one thing to make somebody feel good. She probably made it up. People like Handsome let me know Mom did a lot of creative revision. But this was a good idea.
“Thank you, Becky. That’s quite useful.” I offered her a couple of coppers. “Better scoot.”
“You took that lady to dinner.”
“What?”
“Last night.”
“So?”
“I don’t want money. I want you to take me out.”
Oh. Right. And would I ever hear the end of that? “How come you know what I did last night?”
“I saw you go out the back. I followed you.” She put on her devil smile. “I know what you done.”
“You a dwarf in disguise? You trying to blackmail me?”
“No. But I could tell you who else followed you.”
Whoa! I hadn’t noticed any tail. Not even her. “You have my attention, Becky.”
“You going to buy me dinner? Same place as the blond lady?”
“You got it.” No problem. Her mother would get me out of it. “Soon as I get this job wrapped. Deal?”
She was suspicious. I gave up too fast. But, “Deal. And don’t think you’re gonna weasel out.”
“Talk to me about the somebody who followed me, brat.”
“It was a man. A weird man. Not very tall but really huge-mongous anyway.” She spread her arms. “He walked funny.” She showed me how.
“Mugwump,” I guessed aloud. I hadn’t seen Mugwump’s walk, but that had to be it.
“Mugwump?”
“Man’s name. Probably who that was. He have really big hands?”
“I don’t know.”
Great. “What did he do?”
“Just followed you where you went. After a while he left. He’s really weird, Garrett. He talked to himself all the time.”
“Probably from living in a neighborhood like mine.” I spied Saucerhead Tharpe headed my way. I could think of no reason for him approaching with such a purposeful stride. “Thanks, Becky. Time for you to scoot now.”
“Don’t forget. You promised.”
“Who? Me? Get on with you.” I hoped she would forget, but I never have that kind of luck. “So who died?” I asked Tharpe. The big goof wasn’t even breathing heavy.
“Huh?”
“You were charging this way like a guy loaded with the worst bad news he could imagine.”
“Really? I was thinking about Lettitia.”
“Lettitia? That off the menu at Morley’s?”
“My lady. You haven’t met her yet.” Saucerhead always has a new girlfriend. I didn’t see any bruises so maybe this one was nicer than usual.
“You came for advice to the lovelorn?”
“From you?” His tone wasn’t generous.
“From His Nibs in there. The world’s foremost authority.” On everything. According to him.
“Speaking of him, you give him the latest from down south?”
“Something happen?” The street didn’t have the edgy feel it gets when there’s big news from the Cantard.
“Ain’t out general yet on account of it’s supposed to be a big military secret, but I heard from my sister’s husband who’s got a cousin works for the Stormwarden Burner Skullspite, First Cav Spec Ops raided Glory Mooncalled’s headquarters.”
“Our guys have found his hideout about five times already, you silly groundpounder.” A good-hearted fellow, Saucerhead didn’t quite grasp reality. He’d been a plain old foot-slogging infantryman during his service. He suffered from the common army delusion that cavalry were some sort of elite. I mean, come on! They’re not even Marines. You add in the fact that they’re dimwit enough to voluntarily ride horses . . .
“This was the real headquarters. An old vampire nest.”
Something about his tone . . . “Don’t tell me.”
“The very one.”
“Life is weird.”
An earlier case had taken me back to the war zone. In the course of events, Morley and I and some others invaded a subterranean vampire nest, a stronghold of horror. We were fortunate. We escaped. We passed word to the Army. The soldiers took time off from the war.
The war with vampires takes precedence.
That was before Glory Mooncalled rebelled. Just.
One of my gang had been a centaur. “There’s more?” I asked. Tharpe was antsy. There was something.
“Yeah. The attack was a big ass surprise. They barely figured out what hit them before it was over. They hardly destroyed any documents.”
So Mooncalled’s deep well of luck was running dry.
“What’s the bottom line?”
“Them documents showed he wasn’t in the Cantard no more. Our big boys been chasing shadows.”
I have my moments. “And the only documents the republicans did destroy were ones that might say where the boss was?”
“How’d you know?”
“I’m a good guesser.” This would interest the Dead Man. His hobby was tracking and anticipating Glory Mooncalled.
“They get anything out of the prisoners?”
“Didn’t take no prisoners, Garrett.”
“You always take prisoners.”
“Not this time. Them guys never had no chance, but they wouldn’t give up.”
I couldn’t believe that. However fanatic a group is there’s always a member who doesn’t want to die.
“But that ain’t why I come here, Garrett.”
“Oh?”
“Winger wanted me to—”
“Winger! Where is that oversized . . . ?”
“If you put a clamp on it, I might tell you something.”
The best advice I ever got. It repeated suggestions from my mother and the Dead Man. You have a hard time hearing with your mouth open. I shut mine.
“Winger said tell you that you and her ain’t pulling the same oar no more but you ought to know them West End pansies was coached to tell you what they told you. You was supposed to head off in a new direction.”
He looked at me like he hoped I would explain.
I considered. I thought Robin and Penny had talked straight. They maybe forgot a fact or three but steered a tack close to the truth. Why point me at Marengo North English? Why would Winger turn me away?
Smelled like somebody was dragging a squashed skunk across the trail. Somebody big and blond with too much faith in my naivete. “How would she know?”
“I figure she got it from her boyfriend.”
“Her what? Boyfriend? Since when?”
Saucerhead shrugged. “Been around a while, off and on. She never made no announcement. I don’t figure she wants us to know. You’d come out of your hole and hang out, you would know, though.”
He had a point. Information was the blood of my trade and connections the bone. I wasn’t taking proper care of either. I did before I moved in with the Dead Man. “Go on.”
“She just wanted to warn you. Didn’t want you should step in anything unexpected.”
“That’s my pal. Always thinking of me. She couldn’t drop by herself, eh?”
Saucerhead grinned. “You ask me, she don’t want to get close enough you can get your hands on her.”
“Surprise, surprise.” I glanced over my shoulder. The boys and bird weren’t watching. “Think I’ll wander over to Morley’s. I’ll buy, if you want to come along.”
Morley didn’t seem thrilled to see Saucerhead. He gave me a dark scowl. I couldn’t understand why. Tharpe was a good customer.
Dotes joined us anyway. It was obvious immediately that he was distracted. He listened with half an ear, kept one eye on the door all the time.
I told him, “I’ve got most of it figured.”
“Uhm?” How did he get so much incredulity into one grunt?
“When Maggie Jenn left town, she was so bitter she never wanted to come back. Her lover had been murdered, his people hated her, but she still had to go through the motions to keep what he gave her, for the kid’s sake as well as her own. Her old pal and maybe brother Grange Cleaver played her to get the skinny on the Hill places he robbed, so she got him to play her whenever it was time to make her annual shows. Cleaver was happy to help. It gave him a way to get into and out of TunFaire without getting gobbled up by Chodo Contague. Along the way, he hooked up with the imperials, sold them some con, and got involved with the Bledsoe. Bet you he’s been stealing from the hospital and the Hill place both.
“Now get this. One day along come Crask and Sadler with a tale about Chodo and his little girl. Cleaver eats it up. This is what he’s been waiting for. This is his big chance to get back into the big time in the big town. But there’s a loose end: Emerald Jenn. She’s in the city. A runaway. She knows the truth about Maggie Jenn and Grange Cleaver. And she’ll tell it.”
Morley and Saucerhead looked like they were having trouble grasping it. Why? It wasn’t hard.
“So Cleaver tries to set up an operation here, and nobody signs on because they know about Chodo’s old grievance. Except Winger. And she starts wondering what’s what. But she smells a chance to score. When Cleaver mentions he wants to look for the girl without it being obvious it’s him looking, Winger drops some hints about me, figuring to use me somehow. Cleaver puts on his Maggie Jenn face and hires me, only I mess up by letting it drop that I was warned Maggie was coming. He smells a rat inside his outfit. Who it is doesn’t click right away. Being a good actor, he doesn’t have any trouble staying in character long enough for me to finish up at the Hill place. Soon as I’m gone, though, he takes off for his headquarters and sets it up to get rid of me. He’ll get somebody else to look for the girl.
“Winger hears him sending his men out. She realizes it won’t be long before he figures out who told me he was coming. She grabs anything she can carry and takes off. She helps me get away from the Bledsoe.
“She gives me a double ration of bullshit when I ask her what’s really going on. She still thinks she can make a big score, so now she’s staying away from me.”
Sarge brought tea while I theorized. Morley poured, sipped, grimaced. Evidently the tea hadn’t been brewed from anything off a tea bush. Big surprise. They serve nothing normal there.
Dotes was distracted. He was listening, but every time the door opened he lost his concentration. Still, he’d remained attentive enough to observe, “Your hypothesis doesn’t contradict any of the known facts.”
“Hell, I know that. I made it up. But? I can tell—you have a but.”
“Couple of them. You don’t contradict any known facts, but you don’t account for everything that’s been happening around you. And you’ve done a feeble job of examining Cleaver’s motives.”
“What? Wait. Whoa. You just lost me.”
“Chodo’s kid shirked any of the duties of a kingpin?”
“Hardly. Ice and iron.” I had the gashes and frostbite to prove it.
“Exactly. So whatever Crask and Sadler might claim, being here is a major risk for Cleaver. I’ve identified the pro who’s dogging you. His name is Cleland Justin Carlyle. He’s a specialist assigned to watch you. You get three guesses why. Only the first counts.”
I nodded. “And, wonder of wonders, C.J. was never seen in these parts before I mentioned the name Grange Cleaver to my pal Morley Dotes, once said pal failed to meet up with Cleaver his own self.”
Morley shrugged, which was as good as a confession.
He had no regrets. He never looked back and seldom apologized. He saw no need to apologize now. He asked, “What’s Winger’s angle?”
“I don’t know. I doubt that it matters. She probably doesn’t know what she’s doing herself, she just wants to keep the pot boiling till she finds a way to score.”
Morley slew a pity smile a-borning.
“You know something I don’t?”
“No. You’re ahead of me. Though you do seem to be late catching on to an essential point.”
“Really? What?”
“That Winger lied about everything. Right from the beginning. That not one word she said can be counted on to be true. That anything that comes from her should be thrown out altogether.”
“Oh. Yeah. I knew that.”
I knew it now. Now that I looked at it. Forget everything Winger said. Sure.
“I conned Puddle into doing you a favor, Garrett,” Morley told me. I didn’t ask; I just waited for the inevitable wisecrack.
He fooled me again. The crack didn’t come. “Uhm?”
“I had a feeling you wouldn’t get around to Quefours.”
“Puddle scare him up?”
Morley nodded.
“Waste of time, right?”
“Puddle’s still sulking.”
“What’s the story?”
“Quefours hasn’t seen the girl for eight months. His choice. He broke it off because she wouldn’t play his way. Made her sound prudish.”
“And Quefours doesn’t have the ghost of a notion where to find her now. Right?”
“Wrong.”
“Huh?” I’ve always had a knack for witty repartee.
“He said dig around among the witchcraft community. The girl is looking for something. His notion was you should start with the blackest black magicians. That was where she was headed when they split.” Dotes appended a big nasty smile.
“You saying Cleaver framed her with the truth?”
“Maybe just to get you headed in the right direction.” More teeth. He had to have about two hundred. Looked like he’d been filing them again, too. “Thought you’d get a kick out of that.”
“A kick in the butt.” It just got more confusing. I started to get up.
“Hey!” Saucerhead growled. “You told me . . . ”
“Feed this beast, Morley. Something cheap. Like alfalfa.”
“Where are you going?”
I opened my mouth to tell him and realized that I didn’t know.
“Like that? Then why not just go home? Lock your doors. Get comfortable. Read. Wait for Dean. Forget Grange Cleaver and Emerald Jenn.”
I responded with my most suspicious look.
“You got your advance, didn’t you? This Jenn chit sounds like she can take care of herself.”
“Answer me one answer, Morley. Why did she run away from home?” Might be important if the whole thing had to do with a missing kid after all.
“There are as many reasons for going as there are children running.”
“But they mostly boil down to a perceived need to escape parental control. I don’t know enough about Emerald. I don’t know enough about her mother. Their relationship is a mystery.”
“What did I just recommend? Don’t keep gnawing on it, Garrett. You don’t have any reason. You don’t need any more grief. Turn loose. Spend some money. Spend some time with Chastity.”
“What?”
“Gods preserve us,” Saucerhead muttered. He stopped attacking his dinner long enough to sneer, “He’s got that look, ain’t he?”
“Got what look?”
Morley told me, “The dumb stubborn look you get when you’re about to jump into something without a reason even you understand.”
“About to? I’ve been in it four days.”
“And now you’re out because you know it was a game that didn’t take. You did your usual stumbling around and knocked over everybody’s apple carts. Now it’s over. You’re out. You’re safe as long as you don’t go around irritating people. Consider it a phenomenon. You don’t go charging around like a lunatic trying to find out why if it happens to rain live frogs for three minutes in the Landing. Do you?”
“But . . . ” But that was different.
“There’s no need to find the girl now. Not for her sake, which is the thing that would bug you.”
“Garrett!” I jumped. I hadn’t expected Saucerhead to horn in. Everybody in the place stared at him. He told me, “He’s making sense. So listen up. Nothing I heared about this makes me think these folks’re really worried about the kid.”
“He’s making sense,” I admitted. “Morley always makes sense.”
Dotes gave me a hard look. “But?”
“I’m butting no buts. I mean it. You’re dead on the mark. There’s no percentage messing with this anymore.”
Morley eyeballed me like he believed me so surely he wanted to wrap me in another wet blanket. I complained, “I really do mean it. I’m going to go home, get ripped with Eleanor, grab me a night’s sleep. Tomorrow I get to work on running my guests off. All of them. Only one thing I’m wondering.”
“What’s that?” Morley remained unconvinced. I couldn’t believe that they really thought I had the white knight infection that bad.
“Could Emerald be another Cleaver disguise? You think he could manage makeup good enough to pass for eighteen?”
Morley and Saucerhead opened their mouths to ask why Cleaver would want to, but neither actually spoke. Neither wanted to feed me any reason to go chasing something potentially lethal.
“I’m just curious. He has a rep as a master of disguises. And Playmate told me he’d always thought that the daughter was dead. I wonder if maybe the plot wasn’t more complex than we suspected. Maybe Cleaver didn’t just plant clues up on the Hill. Maybe he created a whole character.”
Morley snarled, “You’re psycho, Garrett.”
Saucerhead agreed. “Yeah.” He was so serious he put his fork down. “I know I ain’t no genius like neither one of you guys, but I do know you got to go with the simplest explanation for something on account of about a thousand times out of nine hundred ninety-nine that’s the way the real story goes.”
What was the world coming to when Saucerhead got a smart tongue on him? “Am I arguing? I agree. Sometimes I think this brain of mine is a curse. Thank you, Morley. For everything. Even when you didn’t mean it.” I left enough money to cover Saucerhead’s meal, though I could have made it to the street before anyone realized that the tab hadn’t been satisfied. I figured Saucerhead deserved it. His luck rolled down a steeper incline than mine. He seldom lived better than hand to mouth.
Me, I, Garrett, was out of the game. Whatever it might be. I was going to go home, get organized, drink some beer, have a bath, scope me out a master plan that included seeing a lot of Chastity Blaine.
But I left Morley’s place with my hackles up, like some atavistic part of me expected the same old gang to be out there set to reintroduce me to the pleasures of the Bledsoe. I was on edge all the way home.
The Bledsoe was a sight, they said. Supposedly it was disappearing behind fast-rising scaffolding.
My tension went to waste. Nobody paid me any mind. I didn’t even get followed. Made me feel neglected.
I’d never had a case as exciting as this just sputter and fade away, but some jobs have. Those kind usually see me ending up snacking on my fee. I recalled with pride that this time I’d been clever enough to snag a percentage up front.
I wouldn’t win any kudos from the Dead Man, but he would have to admit that I was capable of being businesslike on occasion, even in the face of a lusty redhead.
Despite sleeping well I wakened restless. I chalked it up to rising before noon even though Ivy hadn’t pestered me. Once again I wondered if the Dead Man wasn’t stirring. I looked in but saw no sign that he was. But what could you expect? Awake or asleep, the Dead Man’s physical appearance changes only as time gnaws.
Slither and Ivy were unusually subdued. They sensed that I planned to move them out. I had a notion where to send them, too. But old lady Cordonlos wouldn’t believe a word I said to make them sound like worthy potential tenants. Darn her.
So after lunch I consulted someone who might actually give a rat’s whisker about their welfare.
Wonder of wonders, Playmate had some ideas. Before long, my old campaigning pals had probationary jobs and probationary housing and I found me, O miracle of miracles, with my own place all to my ownself again. Except for the Dead Man and the Goddamn Parrot. That cursed bird had gone into hiding before Ivy could hunt him down and take him along. My generous self-sacrifice wasted.
It would be a while yet before I saw Dean again. I hoped. What with Chaz and all . . .
I talked it over with Eleanor. She had no objections, so I wrote a letter and hired a neighborhood kid to deliver it to Chastity. He insisted on a bonus for approaching a wizard’s house.
I checked and rechecked the street while I gave the little mercenary his instructions. I saw no one even vaguely interested in the Garrett homestead. Even my neighbors were ignoring me. Still, I was uneasy.
I squabbled with the Goddamn Parrot till that got old, then communed with Eleanor. I was lonely. Your social circle isn’t much when it consists of a talking bird, a painting, and a character who hasn’t only been asleep for weeks and dead for centuries, he hasn’t been out of the house since you met him.
My friends were right. This was no way to live.
There was a knock. I would’ve ignored it had I not been expecting to hear from Chaz.
Even so, I used the peephole.
It was the kid. He held a letter up. I opened the door, tipped him extra, checked the lay of things again, still saw nothing unusual. I like it that way.
I settled behind my desk, read, then shared the news with Eleanor. “Chaz says she’s gonna pick me up. How about that? One bold wench, eh?”
After a pause, I continued, “All right. Call her a role-breaker, not a bold wench. And she’s gonna stay nontraditional. Taking me someplace she likes. And she’s bringing her father.”
Only a painting, I reminded myself. This chatter was only an affection. No way could Eleanor taunt me with a spectral snicker.
I didn’t much want to meet Chaz’s pop, him being one of the top twenty double-nasty wizards infesting this end of the world. I hoped he wasn’t a real old-fashioned kind of dad. I don’t deal well with foamy-mouthed avengers of soiled virtue.
Another ghostly guffaw? “She says he just wants to ask about Maggie Jenn and Grange Cleaver.”
Right. That worried me more than if she’d tipped me to expect a daddy smoking with outrage.
No good kicking and screaming now.
Eleanor insisted this was a great opportunity to make contacts among the high and mighty. “Right, babe. You know how I value my contacts among the rich and infamous. Exactly what I’ve always never wanted.”
I went to make myself lunch.
My guests had left me my shoes and half a pitcher of water.
I went into that evening with my philosophy of life firmly fixed in mind: expect the worst and you can’t possibly be disappointed. Chastity’s old man was a boomer. If he took a notion, he could flatten me like a cow patty and skip me across the river.
He surprised me. He was no centenarian gargoyle. He looked like an ordinary guy barely on the lying side of fifty. His black hair had gone half silver. He had a small paunch and stood four inches shorter than me. He was groomed till he gleamed. He glowed with good health. Those were obvious badges of power. But he dressed no better than me. And he had the tanned and roughened skin of a guy who spent a lot of time outdoors. He didn’t seem taken with himself, either.
He turned out to be one of those guys who is such a good listener you tell things you didn’t know you knew. That skill would have served him well in the war zone. The best leaders are those with ears.
He interrupted only twice, with penetrating questions. Before I finished, I adopted the attitude I take when reporting to the Dead Man or chatting with Eleanor. I talked to me, thinking out loud.
I finished. Chaz looked at her father. He stayed clammed. I asked, “So how come you’re interested? Because of Chaz and the hospital?” He called her Chaz, too.
“Our home was looted during the crime spree that paralleled Teodoric’s affair with Maggie Jenn.”
I gave Chaz a mild fish-eye. She hadn’t mentioned that.
“A few items were recovered. They traced back to a Grange Cleaver—who couldn’t be found.”
“You didn’t connect him with the hospital Cleaver?”
“I wasn’t here when Chaz decided to work charity. Nor would I have looked for a thief in such a high place.”
“No? I think I’d look there . . . ” I got control of my mouth when Chaz kicked me under the table.
The firelord’s expression told me I was fooling no one. He was right, really. We look for shady characters in the shade. Unless we’re cynics.
“I always thought Jenn was involved, Garrett. That raid took military timing. No outsider knew the family schedule. But you can’t accuse the royal mistress of theft.”
“I see.” Sort of. Chaz offered a smile meant to give me heart. Didn’t work. I had a notion where her dad was headed.
I wasn’t wrong.
Elaine said, “I’m as vindictive as the next guy. Even now I can’t go after Jenn, however much the royals hate her. They take care of their black sheep, too. But Cleaver has no friends that count and no guardian angels. Chaz says she told you we know Colonel Block. I’m pulling strings with the Guard and elsewhere, but I’d really like you to find Cleaver. If Block does it, it ends up on a court docket. I want to deal with Cleaver personally.”
Ker-pungk! The daddy of all fat leather wallets hit the table. “Nice workmanship,” I noted.
Faint smile. “Chaz gives you glowing reviews, Garrett. Westman Black, though, suspects that you can’t dance on water.” I gave Chaz a look. She reddened. “But I know Block, so I solicited other opinions.”
Was I supposed to be impressed? Blaine had begun to sound pompous.
Maybe there was a problem with my hearing.
I gave the Firelord an opportunity to appreciate my raised eyebrow trick. It worked. He told me, “They say you’re the best but you’re no self-starter.” He caressed that wallet like it was a special lady. “Devil snatch you, man! Don’t you have a bone to pick with Cleaver? You could’ve spent your life in a lunatic ward.” He edged that wallet half a foot closer.
Chaz smiled, nodded encouragement. Maybe her daddy danced on water, too.
“I did talk to Block, Garrett. There’s more than money here.” Caress, caress. “There’s a letter of introduction over my chop. Use it any way you want. It says you’re my agent and anyone who won’t help you just might find life unrewarding. There’s also a warrant from the good colonel that you can use to commandeer help from city employees. There are letters of credit that should be sufficient to cover your expenses and fees.”
Oh? And the damned wallet jingled like it was stuffed with more gold than a troll could hoist.
Chastity’s old man had come prepared to do business. He didn’t expect to go home disappointed. And I couldn’t argue with him.
He wouldn’t let me.
He was like all his class—though he did seem inclined to play fair.
Chaz kept right on saying nothing and grinned like she was watching me being inducted into paradise. I stalled. “I’m not sure what you want.”
“Find Grange Cleaver for me. Bring him to me or lead me to him. Once we’re face-to-face, you’re out of it.”
Reluctantly, like that wallet was a real troll-buster, I dragged his bribe toward me. I peeked. I saw pretty calligraphy, nifty official seals, a sweet double handful of shiny gold. And . . . a wishbone? “A killing bone?” I asked.
“What? Oh. That’s right. You served in the islands.” Where the natives owned their own special nasty magic. To which Karenta and Venageta reacted by exterminating its practitioners wherever they were found.
“Yes.” Growl and scowl.
“This isn’t that. This is just a gimmick. Should you get into terrible trouble, spit on the bone. You’ll go out of focus to anyone concentrating on you. Any disinterested observer will see you fine, but somebody trying to kill you won’t be able to fix on you. Clever, eh?”
Maybe. I didn’t say so. I didn’t say his kind were so clever they fooled themselves most of the time.
“All right. It isn’t much. My talents run more toward smashing cities.”
And Chaz kept on smiling like she meant to melt me down.
The firelord excused himself. “Got to run. You’d think I could back off and take it easy now we’ve won the war. You two don’t need me getting in the way, anyhow.”
This guy couldn’t be real. I waved bye-bye. My new boss. Like it or not.
The thrill doesn’t last like it used to.
“Isn’t it great?” Chaz asked. She was so excited. I wondered if somebody had hit her with a stupid spell.
“What?”
Her smile turned puzzled. “What’s the matter?”
“Your daddy.” I kept a firm grasp on that wallet.
“I don’t understand.” She thought I should be pleased.
“I’m concerned about his agenda.”
“Was he indirect? Did he blow a lot of smoke?”
“No.” I couldn’t deny that. “What do you recall about this big ripoff?”
“Nothing. I wasn’t here.”
“Uhm?” I reached deep into my trick bag and came up with my best eyebrow lift. That drives them wild.
“I was away at school. Being finished. Boys go to the Cantard as subalterns.” Her class, she meant. “Debs go to finishing school.”
“Let’s don’t fight.” Especially since I’d survived a face-to-face with a father who wasn’t overburdened with ordinary paternal prejudices.
“Daddy’s people are rustics, hon. He doesn’t fake it. Forget his fire talent. He calls it a curse.” She kept scooting her gorgeous little tail ever closer. I didn’t think she wanted to talk about Daddy anymore.
But I had to ask, “Is this like him?”
“What?”
“Would he hire somebody to hunt somebody so he could settle an old grudge?”
“Maybe. We only got robbed one time. I know he’s never stopped being mad about it. He’d go burn something down whenever he got thinking about it.”
Interesting. Even curious. Not for an instant had he come across as hagridden.
“Come on, Garrett. Forget all that,” Chaz cajoled.
“Yeah? Think I should?”
“I think you should think about what the doctor wants to prescribe.”
I did my eyebrow thing. “Not another thought in my head.” She did an old female trick back that set me to drooling on myself.
In a perfectly cool, rational, businesslike voice she said, “Daddy’s paying. Make a pig of yourself.”
“Oink, oink. But not here.”
“Oooh! Promises, promises. Better be careful. I don’t have to work tonight.”
That was the best idea I’d heard in a while, but because she was one gorgeous woman, I let her have the last word.
A couple of regulars actually lifted welcoming paws when I drifted into Morley’s place. The attitude didn’t infect management, though. Puddle scowled like he was trying to remember where he put that damned rat poison.
Morley was in a good mood, though. He bounced downstairs as my tea arrived.
I said, “I know that look. You just won big on the water spider races. Or somebody’s wife tripped and you ravished her before she could get up.”
He showed me a mouth like a shark’s. “I gather you’re doing some ravishing yourself.”
“What?”
“You were seen with a stunning blonde in a place way out of your class.”
“Guilty. How’d you know?”
“You won’t like the answer.”
“Yeah? Hit me with the bad news. I’m overdue.”
“A couple came in late last night. Slumming. He was mister Flashy. She was Rose Tate. She’d seen you earlier.”
“Bet she had her nasty smile on.” Rose Tate was the cousin of my lapsed girlfriend, Tinnie Tate. And Rose had a grudge.
“She did. You’re going to star in some interesting girl talk.”
“No doubt. But Tinnie knows Rose. Rose mention who else I was with?”
“You running a string?”
“Chaz brought her dad.” I told the tale, then asked, “You ever seen Blaine?”
“No. Why?”
“Wondering about ringers again.”
“You think Chastity is jobbing you, too?”
“It’s paranoia time, Morley. My world has stopped making sense.”
“When you’re well paid, sense needn’t enter the equation. Right?”
“But it helps.”
“You’re concerned about coincidence.”
“What are the chances Chaz would work the same place as a thief that robbed her father?”
“What are the odds you’d get thrown in there where you could meet her? A lot longer, I’d say.”
“How come?”
“Where would a female doctor have the best chance of getting started? Where would the imperials set Cleaver up if they wanted to put him into TunFaire?”
“You figure he’s into something with them?”
“My guess is they think they are, but he’s only using them so he can slide in and out of town without being noticed by people he used to know. You’ll recall he meant nothing to Chastity at first.”
“And her father?”
“You’ll have to do your homework there.”
“I’ve started. His place was cleaned out. It was one of the big jobs of the time. He only got back to town day before yesterday.”
“After this started.”
“And he’s been away for years. Only came home for a few days each winter.” Winter is the slack season in the war zone.
Morley looked at me hard, shook his head. “Your real problem is common sense is nagging you.”
“What?”
“You can’t let this thing alone. You have to keep picking at it. You set yourself up so you’d find an excuse. Now that you’ve done that common sense wants to make a comeback. Forget the Rainmaker, Garrett.”
I jacked one eyebrow way, way up. “Oh?” Did he have a private line on Cleaver?
“He’s on a traveling bullseye now, Garrett. Not mine. You get too close you could get hit by the volley that gets him.” He gestured as though to push me away. “Go. I’ll find out what I can about your lady’s father.”
Had to be magic. By the time I got home, after visiting a couple war buddies now in the extremist human rights movement, my place was surrounded. Ferocious pirates lounged on convenient corners. The guy from the outfit was back, with friends. The clumsy guy was there, and not alone, though I only glimpsed Winger before she vanished.
I’d even attracted some new folks. How many friends and enemies did the Rainmaker have?
I should have gathered the crowd and suggested we set up a pool, reduce duplication of effort, but I got distracted.
Slither and Ivy were camped on my front stoop.
Ivy had the good grace to blush. “We got thrown out,” he told me. “I was trying to explain something to a guy and accidentally said the P word.”
“What? What do you mean, the P word?” I checked Slither. The man looked awful.
“You know. Where he goes berserk.”
Powziffle. Right. “Just out of curiosity, does he remember what he does after he hears that?”
The answer seemed a little much for Ivy’s overtaxed intellect. He shrugged. I had a good idea, though. Might go a ways toward explaining Slither’s problems.
Somewhere, sometime years ago, somebody twisted his mind trying to turn him into a human weapon, his trigger a nonsense phrase. Who and why didn’t matter anymore, but they botched the job. Slither was out of control. He went into the Bledsoe improperly, but he belonged there. Out here he was going to get worse till somebody killed him.
Half the men roaming TunFaire belong inside somewhere. There aren’t that many sane folks around, not that cross my path.
I went inside. The boys followed. Ivy headed for the small front room. The Goddamn Parrot started up. I paused to use the peephole. Morley must have run through the streets screeching about me being back on the job.
Interesting to note that the Rainmaker’s pals were out as fast as his enemies. I wondered if some of those guys worked for Chastity’s daddy.
With the boys so thick, it wasn’t possible they were unaware of one another. That suggested possibilities.
If I was working for the outfit and thought somebody nearby worked for Cleaver, I’d snatch him and forget about Garrett. Were the lot so lazy they wanted me to do their work for them? Nah. They had to know about my lack of ambition.
Slither must have lost the landmarks blazing the trail to the kitchen. He just tagged along after Ivy. While the boys renewed acquaintances with TGD Parrot, I hit the kitchen fast and got my meager stores put out of sight.
Some forsaken jerk started pounding on the door. His knock was so diffident I almost let it go.
The Goddamn Parrot was heaping the Garrett lineage with fulsome praise. “Strangle that jungle chicken. I’m going to sell the feathers.” I returned to the peephole.
Where did they find these guys? Slight financial types, they were the kind of guys who fought their war shuffling papers. The kind of ninety-three-pound brain cases anybody who ever did any real soldiering swore he was going to drown in urine if he ever got the chance . . . Curious. Their kind seldom ventured into my part of town.
Macunado Street isn’t the Bustee but is in a neighborhood silver spoons are scared to visit.
Maybe they had something to do with the Blaines.
I opened up.
Error.
Maybe I did sense something. I did have one hand on the grip of my headknocker. Useful. Because two men as big as Saucerhead Tharpe materialized from the blind spots beside my door and tried to run me over.
I stumbled back, astonished. I produced my stick. The guy nearest me tried to tackle me. I drifted aside and laid my stick across the back of his skull. These clowns had to be from another dimension. Nobody tries to take me at home.
The Dead Man doesn’t suffer disturbances.
Well, not usually. If I hadn’t been busy, I would’ve gone to see what was keeping him. He didn’t stir a mental muscle.
That first guy curled up for a nap. His behemoth buddy scoped it out and opted for a less precipitous approach. He remained confident. He had valiant commodities brokers to harry my flanks.
Slither stuck his head out of the small front room. He didn’t look like he could be much help, but he was behind the crowd. “Hey, Slither. Powziffle pheez.”
My pronunciation was good enough.
The screams for help had died away. I didn’t hear much groaning or furniture breaking anymore, either. Careful to make no noise, I moved the table away from the kitchen door, took a peek down the hall.
Ivy had Slither up against the wall, shaking a finger under his chin. The Goddamn Parrot was on the little guy’s shoulder, singing. Near as I could tell, most of the invaders were breathing.
I stepped into the hallway.
“Why did you have to go and do that?” Ivy whined.
“Because these guys wanted to operate on me without getting patient permission.” Even the guy I put down myself had bruises on his bruises. Slither must have been practicing his fancy dance steps. “He all right?”
“He will be. No thanks to you.”
“Let’s don’t squabble. Prisoners of war here. Get it? Interrogation.” I opened the Dead Man’s door—like I’d be able to see what the hell he thought he was doing, sleeping through all this. I saw what I deserved to see, which was the corpse of a fat Loghyr slouched in a dusty chair.
My pals just needed guidance. When I finished checking on my one-time partner, the invaders were trussed like pigs set for live roasting. The action brought Slither back.
“You guys ever work interrogation?” I asked.
Ivy nodded. Reluctantly, it seemed. Slither looked dumb. He was real good at that. A natural talent.
“My style is to scare them without hurting them—if that can be helped. We have four guys here. One ought to be a weak sister. Right?”
Blank looks.
“We try to figure out which one will tell us what we want to know without we bust them up.”
“Can you do that?”
Why do I try to be a nice guy? Even people on the side of the angels, my side, don’t understand.
I took my pals into the kitchen. We slapped together a really rough meal while we waited for those guys to wake up.
One by one they came around. They didn’t seem thrilled with their circumstances.
Cup of tea in hand, accomplices at my sides, the Goddamn Parrot cussing like he’d invented the genre, I returned to the hallway. “All right, boys. Let’s play a game. Winners get to go home with all their fingers and toes.” If they didn’t know enough to be wary of the Dead Man, they didn’t know I seldom toast off villainous digits.
Slither had his own ideas. He broke a guy’s arm. Casual, no big deal, just part of the job, all empathy absent. When his victim stopped squealing, I said, “Mainly, I want to know who you are. And why you busted in, of course.”
The clerk type with two good arms volunteered, “We were supposed to discourage you. Warn you off.”
“We’re gaining ground. Now clue me in. Warn me off what? Why? And who says?”
He looked at me like I was retarded.
Maybe he was right. “I don’t have a clue, friend.”
“You’ve got to drop what you’re doing . . . ”
“Let’s try getting more specific.”
That didn’t elicit a response. “Lords of Shadow,” I muttered, gesturing at Slither. Slither took a step.
“Hold on! Hold on! Mr. Davenport asked us to convince you that you shouldn’t waste any more time looking for Miss Jenn.”
“Good, Except I don’t know any Davenport. I’ve never heard of any Davenports. Who the hell is he?”
My man got a big “Duh?” look on him. Which meant he did have brain enough to want to find a connection if he was supposed to pound on a guy who never heard of the guy who wanted him pounded. We were confused, us two. But I had Slither to help clarify. Slither glowered. Slither loomed. I remarked, “He likes hurting folks. You don’t want to go home in a litter, you’d better whisper in my ear. And tell me no sweet little lies. What’d I do that got this Davenport clown upset?”
“You’re trying to find Miss Jenn.”
Miss Jenn, eh? “Give me some details. I’m a detail kind of guy.”
The staff type went to talking like he’d contracted diarrhea of the mouth. I squatted beside the flood and panned for nuggets.
He claimed a character named Davenport, good buddy of Marengo North English, didn’t much like the idea of me maybe finding Emerald Jenn, so he’d asked some pals to discourage me. His pals had no idea why Davenport gave a damn who did or didn’t find Emerald.
I poked in a question whenever he paused for breath. He answered everything. He couldn’t shut up now. In time I did understand that I hadn’t gotten on the wrong side of Marengo North English himself. This was Davenport’s alone. Good. I have no desire to get noticed by the lunatic fringe.
I said, “I know this is going to break your hearts, guys, but I don’t give a rat’s ass about that kid. I’m not on that case anymore. These days I’m hunting a creep named Grange Cleaver. You help me out there, I’ll forget you messed up my hallway. I won’t even go break Mr. Davenport’s arms.”
I harvested a crop of blank looks. None of those guys ever heard of Grange Cleaver.
“All right. Out of personal curiosity, because of all this, I would like to talk to Emerald. Pass that on to her. I want to ask about her mother and Cleaver.” I gestured. Ivy and Slither both got my drift without elaborate instructions. Ivy opened the door. Slither herded the gang that way. The Goddamn Parrot got into the game, encouraging their departure. “Hey! You guys want a talking chicken?” Sometimes people are just too fast. Those guys got out without answering or even looking back.
You’d think a talking bird would be a real prize—wouldn’t you?—if you hadn’t been around him long enough to know better.
I watched the watchers watch the flight of the four dismayed human rights activists. Their going didn’t generate much excitement.
Could I lay hands on one of those fierce pirates? If he talked, I could get the Firelord what he wanted fast. Maybe. Cleaver had spent a life being light on his feet. He wasn’t about to convenience anybody now.
I went back to the kitchen, built another sandwich. I checked on the Dead Man. Out of it still. I went back to the peephole. Evening had started lowering its skirts. Which made no difference. The street was as crowded as ever. My fans hadn’t called it a day.
My gaze swept a pair of earringed angels—and I suffered a mighty intuition.
I knew where to find Grange Cleaver. He hadn’t hauled his buccaneer behind out of TunFaire. He was still around, laughing at everybody trying to track him down. It was a game for him. A vicious game. If he feared he risked losing, he’d cut and run.
I summoned Ivy and Slither. “I admit I wanted you guys out of my hair. Didn’t work, but my misfortune looks lucky now.” The Goddamn Parrot didn’t like being left alone. He started spouting off in a big way. I stepped over where he could see me, gave him the evil eye. He shut up while he considered the situation. “I need you to hold the fort.”
Ivy stared. Slither said, “Huh?”
Great. “I’m going out the back way.” I spoke slowly and clearly. “I’m leaving you in charge. Anybody knocks, either ignore them or don’t tell them anything.” I donned my best scowl, faced the Dead Man’s door. Old Bones was way overdue.
Hell, maybe I’d grown too dependent on him. I reminded me that in real life you can’t count on anybody but you, yourself, and you.
“All right, Garrett.” Ivy’s voice was half-strength. Was he fading?
It could be worse. The Dead Man says it can always get worse. Don’t ask me how.
I slid out the back way.
“What’s dis shit?” Sarge bellowed. “I got ta put up wit’ you tree times a day now?”
“Bask in the reflection, my man. Morley is my number one boy now. He up there showing some married lady the ins and out of cross stitch? I could maybe tell him something he wants to hear.”
“Yeah? Like what?” I wasn’t selling Sarge no swamp.
“Like where to find some buried treasure.”
Sarge moved out.
We’ve all endured one another so long we all know when the yak means something and when it’s just macho yammer. Sarge figured I had something, so he got intimate with the speaking tube. I didn’t hear what he said, but hardly three minutes passed before Morley descended the stairs. A woman of astonishing beauty peeked down for a moment, as though she just had to see what improbability could distract Morley Dotes from her. From what I saw of her, I had to consider that an excellent question.
“I’m sorry.” The woman retreated, but my imagination went with her. I hated Morley for having found her first. How did he do it? “Who was that?”
He sneered. “Wipe the drool off your chin. Someone might mistake you for a mad dog werewolf.”
“Who is she?”
“No, you don’t. I was a gentleman about Chaz. I suffered in silence while you wasted Tinnie Tate. I didn’t birddog when that went bad because it might get good again. So forget my little Julie, eh?”
“I’ll give you half a minute.”
“Generous, Garrett. Generous. How come you’re down here making my life miserable again?” Oddly, he seemed anxious. He covered by glancing upstairs like he was thinking about maybe spanking somebody for revealing herself to the rabble. Then he eyed me like he really did expect to hear about buried treasure.
“While back I got the impression you wanted to get face-to-face with the Rainmaker.”
He glanced at the stairway. Glorious, lovely Julie was very much with us even though she remained unseen. He said, “Tell me about it.”
I wondered. I knew Morley’s priorities. Seldom did he find a Julie less interesting than revenge. “I think I know where to find him.”
Morley cast one more longing glance upstairs. “How did you manage that? You turn psychic? Or psycho? Or did the Dead Man wake up?”
“Through the exercise of reason, my man. Pure reason.”
Morley offered me one of his special looks, just to let me know I couldn’t fool a stone with a learning disability. “I’ll bite, Garrett. Where?”
“On the Hill. Maggie Jenn’s place.”
He made a show of thinking about it before he smiled nastily. “Damn if I don’t think you stumbled into it and came up smelling sweet. I should have thought of that. Let’s go.”
“What? Me? No way. I did my part. Take your help. Sarge and Puddle need the exercise. I’ll stay here and hold the fort.”
“Ha. That’s ha, like in half a ha-ha, Garrett.”
“Some guys got no sense of humor.”
“You talking about me? I gave you a parrot, didn’t I?”
“My point exactly.”
“What can you do? People just won’t show any gratitude anymore. All right. Let’s go see the man.”
I smirked. Behind Morley’s back. No sense having him figure out who was manipulating whom. Not just yet.
I began to wonder if there wasn’t an alert out with my name on it. Three times we tried to go up the Hill and three times patrols got in our way. Unbelievably bad luck.
Morley snapped, “Don’t be so cheerful!”
I started to open my mouth.
“And don’t give me that dog barf about never being disappointed if you only look for the worst.”
“You are in a fine mood, aren’t you?” I reflected a moment. “We’ve known each other too long, you realize?”
“You can say that again.”
“All right. We’ve known each other . . . ”
“And you turn into a bigger wiseass every day I know you. The Garrett I used to know . . . ” Off he hared on an expedition into reality revision. We live in different worlds. He remembers nothing the way I do. Maybe that’s cultural.
The old work ethic paid off. Fourth try we got through. As we gained the high ground, I muttered, “I was beginning to think my magic gizmo was working backwards.”
“Your what?”
“Uh . . . I have this amulet thing. Somebody uses a tracing spell on me, I can steer them off.”
“Oh?” Morley eyed me suspiciously.
I don’t tell him everything. And he keeps things from me. You just don’t share everything, friends or not.
As we neared that grim gray canyon of a Hilltop street we grew cautious. I found myself feeling nervous in a premonitory way. And Morley said, “I have a strange feeling about this.”
“It is quiet. But it’s always quiet up here. These people want it that way.”
“You feel it, too.”
“I feel something.”
But we saw no one, sniffed out no slightest scent of a patrol ambush.
We approached the Jenn place through the alley. And strolled right on past, pretending we were scouts for the ratmen who would come for the trash.
Someone had employed the balcony route to get inside. Someone not very circumspect. We judged the break-in to be recent because there was no evidence of the patrol having taken corrective action.
I told Morley, “I need to go in there.”
Dotes didn’t argue, but he wasn’t enthralled by the notion. He observed, “The roof hatch is unlatched—if nobody cared how we got out before.”
We’d left it unlatched because the catch couldn’t be worked from outside. “Just what I wanted to do today. Clamber around rooftops.”
“You’re the one can’t leave well enough alone.”
“The firelord is paying me very well not to.”
“All right. Let’s don’t bicker.” Morley looked around. I looked around. We could’ve been surrounded by a ghost city. Other than the buildings, there was no evidence of human presence.
“Spooky,” I muttered, while Morley scampered up a downspout like some pointy-eared ape. I dragged my bulk after, groaned as he helped me roll onto a flat roof. “I thought I was getting back in shape.” Puff puff.
“Tipping a beer stein doesn’t stress your leg muscles nearly enough. Come on.”
Beer stein? I was getting to be a wiseass? Uh-oh.
Starting after Morley, I glanced back into the alley and spotted a housemaid on a balcony down the way, gaping at us. She had come out while we were climbing. “Trouble,” I told Morley. “A witness.”
“Keep low, then. If she doesn’t see where we go, we’ll have enough time.”
But time for what? I had real strong doubts about the wisdom of my approach, now.
As we neared the roof hatch, I noted that Morley seemed to lack confidence, too. But he was a dark elf, partly. He wouldn’t back down without more reason than a growing premonition.
We listened intently, heard nothing on the other side of the hatch. Grimly, I prized it open an inch. Morley listened with his better ears, peered into the inner darkness with his better eyes. He sniffed, frowned slightly.
“What?” I whispered.
“I don’t know.”
“Someone there?”
“Not that. Open it up. We need to hurry.”
I lifted. There was no racket in the street yet, but I doubted that that would last. Light poured into the stairwell. Neither villain nor monster rose to greet us.
Morley descended quickly. I followed less swiftly, it having gotten inky dark in there once I shut the hatch again. We entered the top story without incident. Morley kept sniffing the air. So did I. I sucked in enough dust to have to fight sneezing. But there was something . . .
A sound echoed up from below, a moaning wail like the last cry of a lost soul. “Spooks,” I said again.
“No.”
No. He was right. Somebody was being hurt badly. I’d just have preferred spooks.
We grew more cautious.
Confident that that floor was untenanted, we stole down a level. I murmured, “We’re going too slow.”
Morley agreed. “But what can we do?” Twice more we heard that cry of agonized despair.
What we could do was get out before the goon squad showed.
The next floor down showed evidence of human habitation. Morley and I held silent debate over the numbers, which had to have been more than a half dozen and possibly the whole crowd from that ugly warehouse.
Another cry. From the top of the stair that led down to the second floor we could hear remote voices engaged in argument. Morley held up three fingers, then four. I nodded agreement. Four. Plus whoever was getting hurt.
The Rainmaker had his reputation for torture, I recalled.
That smell in the air was stronger but not yet strong enough to identify.
Morley kept hesitating about going on down. I no longer wanted to risk even a whisper so had to trust his instincts. As he did start down, something made a clunking racket on the floor below. We froze. Surprise, surprise.
Three very large male individuals dripping sharp steel galumphed across our field of view and headed down the stair to the ground floor. Patrol thugs. Come on the scene via the balcony door, I guessed. Moving fast because somebody tripped over his bootlace and gave them all away.
Morley whispered urgently, “Hide!” He jerked a thumb heavenward. I nodded. It did seem likely that younger and more agile guards would take the path we’d used.
Our timing was superb. No sooner had we ducked under the dustcovers shielding adjacent antiques than we heard lots of boots hustling down from above. I worried about sneezes betraying me. Then I worried about footprints in the dust. I couldn’t recall if there had been enough prior traffic to disguise our movements.
An uproar broke out downstairs. Sounded like a major battle: lots of metal banging metal, people yelling and screaming, furniture crashing. I guessed patrol types had entered at ground level, too.
A pseudopod of combat scaled the stairs. The expected gang from the roof arrived and jumped in. The hollering and cussing grew ferocious, but I kept squeezing my nose anyway. With my luck, those guys would notice even a little sputter of a sneeze.
It got brisk. For a while, despite their edge in the odds, I thought the patrol guys would lose out. They lacked motivation. They hadn’t hired on to get killed protecting property.
I never doubted that people were dying.
The guys on the stairs launched an angry counterattack.
After that the battle lasted only minutes. Soon it left the house for the street. The patrol bunch hollered in angry pursuit of those they had routed.
Came a scratch on the sheet concealing me. I gripped my headknocker, ready for a mighty two-handed swing. Morley whispered, “Let’s go. Before they come back to look around.”
He was right, of course. They would be back. But at the moment we were invisible—assuming the patrol thought the people downstairs were the guys that maid had seen.
The silence didn’t last. I picked out a groan followed by something I hadn’t heard for years—the rasp of a man with a punctured lung trying desperately to breathe.
Morley and I descended in spurts, always ready to flee. We encountered casualties, all of whom had rolled to the bottom of the stair ending on the second floor. None of the four would brawl again.
I knew that smell—now it was fresh and strong.
Blood.
Three of the fallen wore crude patrol uniforms. The fourth had fought them.
“Know this guy?” I asked Morley, sure he knew pro thugs better than I did. And I had recognized Hammerhand Nicks, middleweight enforcer type for the Outfit.
“Yes.” Dotes seemed to grow still more alert.
I told him, “I’m going down.” Not that I wanted to.
I made my feet move. I did want to know.
The smell of death grew dense.
Three more patrol types lay dead in the ground floor hall where the stair ended. Blooded steel lay everywhere. I found another syndicate character there, just less than dead. I beckoned Morley. “Gericht Lungsmark?”
He nodded. “Over there. Wenden Tobar.”
More Outfit hitters. Lungsmark groaned. I moved away. Didn’t want him seeing me if he opened his eyes. “She figured it out before I did.”
“Maybe.” Dotes eased toward the next room, whence came the sounds of the man with respiratory difficulties. “Or maybe she had help.”
“Oh?”
“Lot of ears in my place.” He started to say my name, recalled that this was not the best place. “If somebody told somebody and that somebody moved fast . . . ”
Maybe, but I shook my head. Likely the Outfit did have the pull to get the patrols to do a favor, but . . . “They—”
Morley made a silencing gesture.
No. The patrols wouldn’t get into it with the Outfit without they didn’t know they were up against syndicate guys.
Come to think of it, the hoods probably did the logical thing and snatched themselves a pirate off the street outside my place.
Morley gestured again, slipped through the doorway. I went to the other side, crouching.
We found the fellow with the breathing problem, one Barclay Blue, journeyman bonebreaker. “Going to be some advancement opportunities, looks like,” I said.
Morley scowled. His situation was way less comfortable than mine. Further, there was the question of why Contague associates had gotten into a deadly battle high on the Hill. Not politic, that.
Next room boasted the remains of the main encounter. The Outfit guys had come from farther back and met the invaders there. At least one patrol bruno had carried a crossbow. I counted eight corpses. Four were Outfit. Some fine antiques had been rendered kindling. Blood covered everything.
I didn’t like the implications. Things had gotten way out of hand.
We entered the dining room I’d shared with Maggie Jenn. I understood why the Outfit guys hadn’t been willing to surrender.
The stench of death was heavy. Most of the chairs at the table had dead or probably soon to be dead people tied into them. I recognized the old guys from the warehouse, Zeke, the woman who had served Maggie and me, and others I’d seen on the street. Nobody’s breathing was real robust.
I said, “They were hiding here.”
“There were two battles. Belinda Contague won the first one.”
Fourteen people were tied into the chairs. Zeke and Mugwump were among the breathing. Excepting several guys who obviously got themselves killed when the thugs moved in, everyone had been tortured. None of the survivors were conscious.
Morley asked. “You see any Rainmaker? I don’t. No Maggie Jenn, either.”
“He’s famous for not being there when the shit comes down.” I double-checked Mugwump. He was the healthiest of the survivors.
“Yes. He is. What are you doing?”
“Cutting the guy loose. Sometimes I do stuff just because it feels right.”
“Think you’ll find anything useful here?”
“Probably not.” I noted that we were no longer a we. “Probably be a good idea to go.” We’d have the victorious patrolmen back soon and the Guard right behind them.
A bloody knife lay on the floor, probably a torture instrument. I placed it in front of Mugwump. “So let’s scat.”
“Freeze, slimeblog!”
Huh?
I was always a rebel. I didn’t freeze. I didn’t even check to see if I was outnumbered.
Neither did Morley. And he was where the speaker couldn’t see him.
I dove, rolled, came to my feet out of view, charged. Morley attacked from the other side of the doorway, low, shrieking.
One lone heavyweight had thought he could bluff me. He didn’t pull it off.
Morley smacked and kicked him about nineteen times. I whacked away with a headknocker rendered magically unbreakable. Down the man went, his expression saying it just wasn’t fair. Poor baby. I knew what he meant. Just when you think you’ve got it knocked, along comes some clown with a bigger stick.
Morley and I got no time to congratulate ourselves. More patrol types materialized. After the intellectual form of their subspecies, one demanded, “What’s going on here?”
Bippetty-bappetty-bopp!
I was not unaware that real heroes flail around with singing swords while I rated only an enchanted hunk of oak.
Morley whooped and hollered and popped guys all over the place. He was having a great time. He could hustle when he was motivated.
We broke through. We headed upstairs, disdaining the front way because every thug on the Hill had gathered to attend the business of counting bodies, cussing villains, and abusing captives.
My normally abysmal luck failed to assert itself completely, mostly because the patrol guys were making so much racket. They couldn’t hear me and Morley getting away.
“Let’s try the balcony first,” Morley suggested. “And quickly.”
I didn’t expect an easy getaway. Anybody with half a brain would have posted guards at every potential exit.
You never know, though, when you’re dealing with TunFaire’s bonebreakers. Most can’t think past the next arm they mean to twist. They’re efficient and technically polished within their specialty but feeble when it comes to planning and making decisions.
There had been a major engagement on the second floor, back toward the balcony door. There was a lot of blood but no bodies. Blood trails indicated that several bodies had been dragged out of what had been a lumber room last time I looked. My impression was that here was where the Outfit’s invasion first met serious resistance. I wondered why. That room was no place to make a stand.
I took time out to look it over.
What the hell?
Seconds later, Morley called from the balcony exit, “What’re you doing? Come on! There’s nobody out there right now.”
I finished scanning the vellum sheet, one of several pages come loose from a book evidently damaged during the fighting. The rest of the book was gone. The loose pages might have gotten lost during a hasty getaway.
“I’m going to leave you here,” Morley threatened.
I folded the vellum, slipped it into my shirt. Best to get going and not pique Morley’s suspicion. I’d read the story before, anyway. The whole book, not just one page.
I reached the balcony, saw that Morley had given up on me and dropped into the alleyway. I glanced right and left, spied no trouble moving in. I landed beside Dotes. “We probably ought to split up now.”
He eyed me closely. He’s sure that any time I know what I want, I’m up to something that won’t be to his advantage. I can’t fathom why he would think that way. I said, “Do me a big one. Couple hours from now I’m going to lead that clumsy guy down to your neighborhood. Help me grab him.”
“Why?”
“I want to talk to Winger. He’ll know where to find her.”
He gave me another glimpse of his suspicious side, then told me, “Be careful. Right now, they’re touchy around here. They’ll jump anything that moves.”
I nodded, less concerned about me than about him.
I wasn’t in a real good mood. I didn’t turn cartwheels when Colonel Block waved his clowns off and told me, “Cheer up, Garrett. It’s all straightened out.”
“How can you put these clowns on the street if they can’t recognize a pass put out by their own beloved captain?” What, me worry about getting off the Hill? I had passes and paper from a troop of heavyweights.
“The fellow who reads and writes doesn’t normally opt for a career in law enforcement. And you’ll have to admit that you refused to provide any good reason for being where you were found.”
“Where I was found? I was—”
“Detained, then.”
“And with way too much enthusiasm. I did try to cooperate. They wouldn’t let me talk.”
“I will.”
“Huh?”
“I’ll let you explain. To your heart’s content.”
A wise guy. I admonished myself to be careful. Quietly. “I was just trying to do what the Firelord hired me to do. I’d heard a rumor the Rainmaker was hiding out on the Hill.”
Block offered me a try again look. I wasn’t snowing him. His agents would have relayed any such rumors. “What happened in that house, Garrett?”
“You have me at a disadvantage, Captain.”
“It’s Colonel, Garrett. As you know. And that’s true. I do have you. If I wanted, I could send you over to the Al-Khar to be held for questioning. It’s entirely possible for somebody to fall between the cracks there, same as in the Bledsoe.”
The Al-Khar is TunFaire’s city jail. “Why you want to be like that?”
“Mainly because I don’t like to be jerked around. I have an eyewitness who saw two men climb a drain-spout. One of them was dressed exactly like you.”
“Without so many rips and tears, I’ll bet. Doubtless a daring youth out pretending to swash a few buckles. An amazing coincidence.”
“Witness summoned the local patrol. Patrol went looking around and found a house showing multiple signs of forced entries. Inside they found lots of corpses and plenty of people willing to fight. I wouldn’t accuse you of stretching any rules, Garrett. Not you. You’re not that kind of guy. But I’d bet that if I wanted to spring for a cut-rate diviner, I could place you inside that house. Hm?”
I admitted nothing.
“Give me a hint, Garrett. Who were those people?”
I could discern no obvious profit in keeping my yap shut and sliding farther out of official favor. “Some were the Rainmaker’s people.”
“Was that so hard?”
Of course it was. Guys like me aren’t supposed to cooperate with guys like him, especially if doing so would save some headaches. In my racket, you’re supposed to be troll-stubborn. Apparently, dumb is supposed to help, too. “The others answered to the Combine. I’ve heard that a long time ago Cleaver had some part in the death of Chodo’s brother.” I doubted Block was hearing much that was news.
“I see. And Chodo pays his debts.”
“Always.”
Block had stayed seated, fortified behind his desk. Now he picked up a folded document bearing a fancy seal, tapped it against his desk top. “How bad will it get, Garrett? We in for a gang war?” That wouldn’t look good on his record.
“I doubt it. You know Chodo’s rep. Cleaver had to hire his muscle out of town. After this fiasco, he’ll have not friends left. His dearest boyfriend is gonna ask ‘Grange Who?’ ”
Block kept tapping that document. It looked more legal by the minute. He mused, “So many people interested in Grange Cleaver.” He waved that paper. “Including mine, now.” As if only then realizing what he held, he said, “This just came in. One Grange Cleaver is to be found and brought before the Court of Honor of the Magistry of Manpower Procurement. There’s no record of him having performed his obligated service to the realm.” You had to be there to get the full effect of Block’s seditious sneer and sarcastic tone.
I grunted. Hadn’t I thought maybe Cleaver was a dodger?
“I’m not going to strain myself trying to round up dodgers. Get out of here, Garrett.”
I patted myself. Yep, I’d gotten back everything that was mine. Block’s crew were almost honest. I started to take his advice.
“Wait!”
Damn! I knew he’d change his mind. “What?”
“You still seeing Belinda Contague?”
He knew too much about me. “No.”
“Too bad. I thought you might suggest to her that her dad recall that it’s to be kept off the Hill.”
“Oh.” A slightly more than gentle hint that he wanted all that passed along. “I don’t think there’ll be a problem again.” Since all of Belinda’s thugs dumb enough to get involved up there were no longer with us.
I got out.
It had been a long, hard day. And it was just getting started. Aching all over, looking way too much like a guy who got into one-sided brawls with zealous minions of public safety, I sneaked through the postern door of the Royal Library. Which was a whole lot less of a big deal than you might think.
Old Jake was supposed to keep that door secure, but when he did that his wartime cronies couldn’t get in with supplies of liquid refreshments. Old Jake was all the security the library had. He didn’t get around so well on his wooden leg, but his heart was in the right place. Linda Lee had a bad habit of saying he was me at twice the age.
Jake was asleep. What the hell. There wasn’t a lot in the library your average thief would consider worth stealing.
I slipped past the grizzled old goat. He was snoring. I’d seldom seen him do anything else. Hard to believe he’d been given a job for life because he’d lost his leg becoming one of the all-time heroes of the Royal Marines. Sometimes it’s better to have your legends dead.
I went looking for Linda Lee. I hoped I wouldn’t scare many of her coworkers before I found her. They were easily spooked.
She found me.
I was peeking around the end of a stand of shelves—stacks, in the approved jargon—when she spoke behind me. “What the hell are you doing in here?”
I caught my breath, got it back where it belonged, made sure my feet were back on the floor, then turned around. “I’m thrilled to see you, too. You’re as lovely as ever.”
She looked me up and down. Her cute upper lip wrinkled. “You just stay where you are. And answer the question.”
I opened my mouth, but she didn’t stop. “You really ought to take more trouble with your personal appearance. Good grooming is important. Come on. What are you doing here?”
I opened my mouth.
“You’re going to get me into bad trouble—”
I pounced. I clapped a hand over her mouth. She wiggled a little—a not unpleasant experience. “I wanted to talk about the book somebody stole from you. Was it a first edition of The Raging Blades?”
She managed to stop wiggling and started listening. She shook her head.
Startled, I growled, “Damn it! I really thought I had it locked.” I turned her loose.
“It was a first of The Steel-Game. The library has had it since early imperial times.” She went on about some ancient emperor having wanted to assemble a set so he could seek Eagle’s fabulous horde, about how no outsider could have known the book existed.
I expelled some remarks of my own. “Ha! I was right! Wrong book but right idea.” I produced the fragment of vellum I’d lifted from Maggie Jenn’s place, a solitary page from The Metal-Storm, edition uncertain, but people had died trying to protect it from other people who hadn’t cared about it at all. The intensity of that encounter had set the tone for the atrocities that followed.
Linda Lee asked, “What about The Raging Blades? We’ve never had a first of that one.”
“Because I saw a copy the other day. Somewhere where it shouldn’t have been. But I didn’t realize that until today. Then I thought I could solve your troubles.”
I’d begun developing troubles of my own. Linda Lee wouldn’t stay still. I couldn’t stay focused. She was too close and too warm and had begun purring like she really appreciated my thinking of her.
“You just come on down here, Jack! I’ll show you. You wouldn’t believe me, but I’ll show you.”
A voice muttered, “I wouldn’t believe you if you told me the sky was up, old woman.”
“You fell asleep. You go ahead and lie, but we all know you fell asleep at your post and let an outsider get in. You’re too old.”
I hated that woman’s voice almost as much as I hated the voice of the Goddamn Parrot despite having heard it only a few times. Those few were a few too many. It was nails on slate, whined through the nose, always complaining.
“Talking about old, you been dead three years but too damned stupid to realize it. Still got people to make miserable, too.” Old Jack didn’t care if he hurt her feelings, but it wasn’t likely he would. She was two-thirds deaf.
“You were sound asleep when I came to get you.”
“I was resting my eyes, you impossible hag.” Clump! Old Jack collapsed. His fingers weren’t too nimble anymore. When he got in a hurry, he sometimes failed to get his wooden leg strapped on right.
I gave Linda Lee a peck on the forehead. “I’d better run.”
“Later.” She winked fetchingly. I’ve always had a soft spot for women who wink. “Promise,” she breathed, then went to help Old Jack. She ignored the old woman, who didn’t miss the attention. She was doing just fine carrying two sides of an argument herself.
I ducked out of sight. The old man hadn’t seen me, so he started spouting off about frustrated old maids who imagine men lurking behind every stack.
A long, hard day, and not yet done. I had aches where plenty of people don’t have places. I’d walked too many miles and had been thumped too many times. Hell, this was like the bad old days when the Dead Man made sure I got no rest at all.
I told myself I would make one last stop, then I would hang it up for the day. Then I groaned. I recalled my arrangement with Morley.
Not Winger on top of everything else. Why had I done that?
Good soldier, I soldiered on.
I wondered what bean-brained civilian had come up with that one. Every soldier I ever knew never moved a muscle unless that was the final option.
I sensed trouble long before I hove in sight of Wixon and White. That end of town was silent with the silence that bubbles around immediate, terrible violence.
The moment passed. The ghouls were gathering when I reached the storefront, panting over the bloody wreckage.
One look and I knew smart money would choose putting one set of toes in front of the other and repeating the process briskly. In my case, while facing in a southeasterly direction. But I just had to take a fast look around the shop.
Colonel Block banished his henchmen with a wave. “Cheer up, Garrett. It’s all straightened out now.”
“Must be an echo in here.” Not to mention way too much sunlight. The stuff flooded in through an open, eastern window casement at gale force. It was way too early for any reasonable man to be upright. Block obviously wasn’t reasonable. Tell the truth, I wasn’t feeling real reasonable myself. “We’ve got to stop meeting like this.”
“Wasn’t my idea, Garrett. You enjoy your accommodations?”
I’d spent a too-short night on a straw pallet in a stinking cell in the Al-Khar, charged with being a possible witness. “The fleas and lice and bedbugs enjoyed my visit.” They should feel right at home. Block was a dirty dog.
“This is where you tell me why my men found you right in the middle of another massacre.”
“Somebody yelled for help and your gang actually showed up. I was amazed.” The old Watch would have headed the other direction, just to make sure nobody got hurt that didn’t need hurting. “Thought you said it was all straightened out.”
“I meant I know you didn’t slice anybody into cold cuts. Witness says you showed after the screaming stopped. I want to know why what happened happened. And how come you were there.”
“Grange Cleaver.”
“That’s it?” He waited for me to say more. I didn’t. “I see no connection. Maybe you’ll enlighten me. Meantime, you should know it looks like some really nasty black magic did the killing.”
I nodded, but I didn’t believe it. “That’s what doesn’t make sense.” Someone made it look like magical murder. I was willing to bet Robin and Penny had kept their appointment with doom through the agency of a devil named Cleaver, once again trying to point a false finger at Marengo North English. Made me think Emerald Jenn was holed up with North English and Cleaver wanted to bust her loose.
“Why do I got a feeling you’re being too cooperative, Garrett?”
“What? Now what the hell do you want? I answer your questions, you get aggravated. I don’t answer them, you get aggravated. If I wanted aggravation, I’d stay home and argue with the Dead Man.”
“You’re answering questions, but I got a hunch you aren’t telling me what I want to know.”
I took a deep breath. We were about set for one of those ferocious head-butting sessions so gratifying to men of our respective professions. I exhaled . . .
An ugly little breed stormed in. He scowled at me like I had no right to be cluttering up Block’s office. I nodded. “Relway.” He didn’t respond.
“It’s started,” he told Block.
“Damn them.” Block lost all interest in bugs as small as me. Must be fatter victims available somewhere else. He glared at me, though. “The Call.” He stalked after his secret police chief, who was gone already. “Get out of here. And try not to stumble over any more bodies.”
Good advice all. Maybe he wasn’t a complete dunce.
What was that about The Call?
Didn’t take long to find out. I hit the street. Off east, looking like it might not be rooted far from my place, was a growing tree of smoke. I caught snatches of news from people rushing through the streets.
A bar brawl had turned into major racial trouble. Humans were going after centaurs. Apparently, it hadn’t gotten out of hand till somebody in The Call had served up an inflammatory diatribe and people had responded by firing the homes of centaur immigrants. Other species were becoming involved. There had been some kind of deadly guerrilla battle in the scaffolding festooning the Bledsoe. They were losing ground getting the hospital repaired.
The insanity had begun. I hoped Block and Relway could contain it. At least this time.
There would be other times. And they would get worse before they got better.
People were going to get polarized real soon now.
I walked carefully. And went about it visible to anyone who might have a tracking spell laid on me.