by Glen Cook
“Well, hell. It’s something. Thanks. Tell you what, you find yourself with time on your hands, you could take that to the Dead Man. He’ll mine out the clues you caught but didn’t notice consciously.”
I didn’t have to explain. He was a veteran of the Dead Man’s operations.
“I’ll work that in later. After the show.” Besides the play in rehearsal, Salvation had two more running, one of those also at the World. The World was unique in that it could put on four plays at once, often a nightmare for everybody but the audiences.
I started to ask if he could have Alyx Weider come to the table for a minute, but then there was no need. Her father came in from the street with Heather Gilbey. Manvil’s wife managed the World, which was owned by the brewery. Morley’s people found them a table instantly, to the disgruntlement of a couple who had been waiting. Heather braved the theater crowd to ask Alyx to join her and her father.
There would be no need for me to brave the furious solidarity of all those womenfolk yonder.
Resolute, I turned my back.
Belinda snickered. “That Alyx is a piece of work.”
I raised an eyebrow inquiringly.
“She’s down on you for hurting her friend when she tried to get you to wrestle, what, maybe fifty times?”
“As I’m sure she’d tell you, that was a whole different bucket of monkey guts. Have you learned anything I might find useful?”
She didn’t challenge my presumption. We both knew she’d help with the hunt. I’d do the same for her in personal circumstances, and had. I wouldn’t help her with the kinds of problems that resulted from her business, nor would she ask.
“Nothing yet. It’s early. Anything as big as this is will cause ripples of some kind, though.”
No doubt. Before long we should be hearing lots of little things like the request for bronze swords. Most would have nothing to do with Strafa or the Tournament of Swords, but they would have to be noted, investigated, and studied by the Dead Man.
“Patience is the name of the game now, Garrett. Impatience will get you laid down beside your wife.”
Even Belinda had become a Strafa fan.
“I know that with my head. It’s my heart that’s giving me trouble.”
Morley said, “I’ll go visit that shop Jon Salvation told us about.”
Belinda shook her head. “You stay here and wrangle your eggplants, lover. Keep faking good citizenship. Let the real bad guys break the rules.”
Morley’s lips went tight and white till he grasped the fact that Belinda wanted to protect him, not to rob him of his manhood by henpecking his social routine. He relaxed, nodded, said, “Somebody has to make sure the leader of the pack here gets home with a minimal number of bits missing.”
“Which thinking I do appreciate, Morley,” I said. “But. . Bell, when are you thinking about visiting that shop?”
She raised her eyebrows. She did not have the skill set needed to do just one by itself.
“If it was soon I’d tag along. I need to work on getting my edge back.”
Belinda glanced at Morley. Something passed between them. Belinda said, “How about after you finish your lunch?”
“I’ve got nowhere else to go but home.”
35
The shop was one of those places with airs and a clever name, Flubber Ducky. Which I didn’t get. Maybe no one else did, either, because I didn’t get an answer when I asked around. I never got to ask anyone inside. I came close to getting no chance to open my yap at all. Belinda wanted me to stay in the background and keep quiet. She didn’t want me asking questions that could be interpreted only as part of a quest to unearth the Operators.
There was more to her thinking, but she wasn’t inclined to share it.
With little more than an eyeblink and a wave of her fingers, she conjured the Contague family coach and half a dozen very large, hard men who would drive, ride the footmen’s running boards, or trot along ahead or behind on horseback. That she had only six escorts today told me that peace reigned in the underworld-for the moment.
Belinda faced more challenges than her father ever had simply because she was a woman. So many ambitious villains just could not believe that she was as ferocious and crazy as she really was.
We reached the shop Jon Salvation had mentioned. It really was called Flubber Ducky. It had a sign outside saying so. Amazing. Belinda’s thugs isolated it without being given specific instructions, establishing a unidirectional customer flow. There were no complaints. These were the kinds of guys who got their way just by standing around looking grim.
There were only a few customers inside, all on the costumers’ side. Belinda isolated the elder of two men working props. He fit Jon Salvation’s description of the clerk who had dealt with the men who had wanted bronze swords. She moved in close enough for her hot breath and buxom proximity to be intimidating. “Two men came here looking for bronze swords. Who were they?”
The clerk did that dumb-goldfish-tasting-the-water thing while seeing nothing but Belinda’s fierce red lips and strange blue eyes, all within licking distance. Could dread hetero possibly be catching?
Belinda used a soft, gentle, terrifying voice to suggest, “Talk to me while you still can.”
The clerk chewed on the air. A breeder storm had fallen on him out of a cloudless sky. He didn’t understand, except that this might be the start of something bad.
“Talk to me,” Belinda urged in her deadly mommy voice. “Who were they?”
“I don’t know, ma’am. They never said.”
I winced. Belinda’s ego was not yet ready for “ma’am.” Like Lady Tara Chayne Machtkess, she might never be ready.
She said, “They bought stuff.”
“Yes, ma’am. Robes. Other ceremonial-style stuff. Best quality.”
“Which will have to be delivered somewhere.”
“No, ma’am.” He gulped some more air. “They said they would pick everything up.”
“When?”
“A week from yesterday. They paid for priority service.”
“Did they say who would do the picking?”
“They said they would come themselves.”
That didn’t sound smart.
Maybe they weren’t villains. Or maybe they were sure that nobody would be looking for them.
The tournament thing was so completely anachronistic, why not?
Belinda kept pressing but didn’t get much more, other than to extract a copy of the order that the old men had placed, after which she wheedled the old clerk into telling her where the old men went to get their bronze weapons made.
“Normally we would commission the blades ourselves, passing them on at a big markup. Those men didn’t seem concerned about costs, but they were creepy. Scary creepy. I wanted them out of the shop. So I sent them to the smithy we use for specialty stuff. I sent a runner to tell Trivias to set the price high and kick back a sucker’s fee to Flubber Ducky.”
Belinda gave me a warning look. I was getting restless and was making inarticulate noises indicating that I had something to say. When she could take it no more, she snapped, “What?”
“We need to find a way to have this fellow visit my house.”
Belinda’s frustration faded. “Of course. That makes perfect sense. I should’ve thought of that. Elwood.” She turned to the largest of her large men. “Load our witness in the coach and take him to Mr. Garrett’s home in Macunado Street. Wait for him, then bring him back when he’s done visiting.”
“No, you don’t! Oh no, you don’t!” A skinny little guy, barely five feet tall, mostly bald but with hair six inches long where he had any hair at all, bustled in from the other side of the shop. He carried what looked like a naval belaying pin in a left hand that lacked its two outermost fingers. His eyes were a washed-out, watery blue, but they were fierce and fearless.
His sojourn in the Cantard was a long time gone. He was out of practice at the killer’s trade. He had lived in the tailor’s wor
ld since coming home. But he had not lost his courage, nor had he gained a grip on reality.
Nobody who had that grip would tie into Belinda’s crew the way he tried.
He did have the advantage of surprise. Briefly.
Belinda’s heavyweights broke some stuff, not including the tailor but that only because their boss insisted that she just get his attention. She examined price tags attached to the damaged goods. “Those were just display pieces, right?” She slipped a gold angel into the left-side pocket of Mr. Feisty’s blouse. “Take this one, too, Elwood. Leon, help wrangle. The rest of us will visit the man who is going to make those swords.”
Elwood and Leon, gently for thugs, showed the craftsmen to their transport. The rest of us gathered on the street, to debate the best way to get where we wanted to go-except for one normal-size but scarred and remarkably ugly character called Bones who stayed to explain to the staff that the damage they were about to put right could as easily happen to people who could not overcome a compulsion to whine to the tin whistles.
It had been said that Bones had gone for a run through the Forest of Ugly blindfolded on a moonless night and had banged into every tree before he got to the other side. With the scars added he was one intimidating character. It was not often that he was forced to act.
There was a tin whistle in the street, half a block west of Flubber Ducky, deftly ignorant of any miscreantcy that might be happening within rock-throwing distance of the Chodo family coach.
36
Closer to hand and ecstatic about seeing me again was my pal Brownie. Her number two, which I had decided would be called Number Two henceforth because of her number-two attitude, wasn’t nearly so pleased. The other two ladies didn’t care, one way or another, but they were happy that Brownie was happy.
The strays from earlier hadn’t stuck with the crew.
Belinda asked, “These your friends from in back of the Grapevine?”
“Yeah.”
“They were at the cemetery.”
“Yeah. That odd girl was with them, too, when they caught up with me near Playmate’s place. Her attitude was still the same. Playmate has her now. He’s gonna try to find out who she is and what we ought to do with her.”
“She was pretty.” She checked for the mouse in my pocket.
“She was.” In fact, on reflection, I thought she had looked a lot like Belinda might have when she was still a fresh fourteen.
Elwood, Leon, their guests, and the sullen driver of a coach drawn by four Garrett-contemptuous drays headed westward toward my Macunado estate.
Belinda said, “That’s enough of that. Let’s walk.”
I glanced at her, thought about Little Moo, wished I had known Belinda when she was that age. But I would have been that age, too, then, which meant my head would have been on sideways.
Belinda’s remaining troops spread out. Brownie took her usual place, forcing Belinda around to my left. That did not sit well there, but Number Two kept her displeasure contained. She sensed that Belinda’s level of tolerance for uppity canines was quite low.
We hardly got our bad selves sorted into a traveling formation, reminiscent of the squad diamond of my defense days, when we got to the shop where most of the theater industry’s custom metalwork got done. Belinda invited us all inside despite the protests of some apprentices who, after considering the odds, put their hands in their pockets and stuck to muttering.
Belinda told them, “I want your master out here. Now.”
So I was expecting a master smith on Playmate’s scale, high and wide and muscle-bound. Instead, we got a guy who had some elf and a bit of dwarf in him, about five feet tall, who ambled out of the forge shed cleaning his hands on a rag. I was looking past him for the burly guy when he asked, “You wanted to see me?”
Me, Belinda, her crew, and the dogs all snapped to a higher level of readiness. He sounded like a martial arts master, confident, at peace, absent any concern. This was somebody who could be dangerous if he wanted.
Belinda said, “You were asked to make replicas of antique swords. The men who commissioned them were involved in the murder of this man’s wife.” She indicated me, gaping at the mad queen of crime being polite and reasonable. “We want to find them so we can ask them a few questions.”
The smith eyed me, considered Belinda, cataloged her thugs, even checked Brownie and her crew. I got the impression that he saw more than what was immediately obvious-in keeping with the martial arts master image. With those guys it’s always all about perception. He said, “I see.” Slightest of frowns as he took another look at Brownie. Puzzled, “The dogs have nothing to do with that, right?”
He was mumbling to himself, so nobody responded.
He took a single step toward me. “Please tell me your story. It would be best if you don’t edit.”
I grinned, slipped into the mode I use while reporting to the Dead Man, confident that this man deserved complete honesty and respect. I gave him exactly what I had given Deal Relway. Belinda’s troops grew restless before I finished.
The smith said, “You cleave to the truth as you know it. I did get a negative feel while those two were here. Also, I will stipulate that I know Tournaments of Swords used to take place, but I thought the last one happened about eighty years ago.”
“There have been others more recently. Tries, anyway. My wife’s grandmother helped mess up the last one.”
“As would appear to be the case again. One wonders why the Operators would go ahead in the face of such poor odds.”
“One does wonder.”
The smith considered the dogs again, obviously intrigued. I wondered why. The mutts clearly were not pets.
He was even more intrigued by Belinda. She had not identified herself, but it was plain what she and her men must be, if not who.
The smith said, “I hold no brief for the tournament concept, especially in a form where the contestants are expected to die.”
Belinda made a tiny gesture meant to caution me. Impulse control was no problem, though. I could see that the smith needed space to lead himself on.
I had witnesses. We could declare a day of celebration later: Garrett kept his big damned mouth shut for a whole damned minute. . How long the miracle might persist remained to be seen.
“My problem would be diminished if the participants entered the game of their own free will. But even then there is the ugly prospect of so much power ending up condensed into one person smart enough and ruthless enough to slaughter all the others, some of whom would have been friends or, at least, lifelong acquaintances.”
I had to break my silence. “Wow!” The fighting and killing longtime friends might be a key reason why Shadowslinger and her friends were determined to sabotage the process. That last man standing would be a very dark personality indeed.
And maybe I was last to really get that. Belinda had seen it right away. Enlightened self-interest might be moving her more than friendship was. That kind of villain, running loose, would not benefit her shadowed interests.
It occurred to me suddenly that Strafa could have been murdered by someone she thought was a friend. That would explain how the killer got close enough to hit her with a big-ass crossbow.
The wee smith told me, “I can’t control my curiosity. Tell me about the dogs.”
37
Something about Trivias encouraged me to talk. Plus, I saw that Brownie and friends were interested in him, too, once he focused on them.
Belinda and crew weren’t as inclined toward patience with the pups. They kept their attitudes restrained, however, she because she’d known me long enough to understand that most anything could turn out to be relevant in anything connected to me, even what just looked like “stuff happening.”
In life, though, stuff usually happens without being a cog in a carefully constructed plot.
So I was forthcoming with Trivias despite knowing nothing about him other than that he felt comfortable. Belinda’s crowd closed in to listen
while Brownie’s bunch decided to become fans of the smith. He gave all their ears a scratching and demonstrated killer skills as a flea catcher. He asked, “You did some thinking about the girl?”
“Definitely. But I still don’t know who she is or why she hates me.”
He considered the dogs. They considered him back, body language apologetic because they were with me and therefore not free to commit themselves to him.
I asked, “Do you have any idea what’s going on?”
“In a folklore sense, perhaps, but not in a quotidian world sense.”
Oh my. Only the Dead Man ever uses words like that. I wasn’t sure what “quotidian” meant. I grunted, mostly to prove that I was listening.
“I’ll think about it. The tournament is something of a folklore artifact, too, but I doubt there’s a connection. Your grandmother was right about the girl, though. Whatever the strain, whatever she does, be kind. That’s the only way to win through.” Having thus spoken with sybilline clarity, or the precise exactitude of a wizard, he patted Brownie and Number Two, and added, “I do wish I could be more help.”
Belinda said, “You still could be. The bronze swords. How about I leave someone to greet their buyers when they pick them up?”
“Oh. Yes.” The smith mimed thought, nodded, said, “And now for a better idea. You.” He jabbed a finger at me. “Exploit your family connections. Have your grandmother produce tracer charms I can put into the hilts of the swords.”
“That’s a damned fine idea!” Shadowslinger could then follow the weapons around. We could identify anyone who carried one.
Belinda, being Belinda, wasn’t happy with being outthought but was never so long on pride that she would burn a good idea because somebody else came up with it. She stipulated, “Good thinking.” She did give the smith a suspicious look. Craftsmen are supposed to be clever with their hands, not their heads.
Trivias obviously was more than a hammer-and-tongs kind of guy.
I said, “I’d better get on that part fast.” I had a feeling that there was little time to waste even though preparing the grips of swords would be among the last steps of the manufacturing process.