Sir Simon stood up a little straighter, as if, by doing so, he might better see the hunched figure down by the pond. "He mistreated her, then?"
"I should not say mistreated her," said the Count, following her every movement with his eyes, a strange smile quirking his lips. "I believe that his intention was to shield her. He had no desire to make a freak show of his pretty Eirena. One must honor his delicacy, of course. Such a dainty creature can only be . . . enjoyed . . . by a true connoisseur, would you not say?"
Sir Simon eyed him suspiciously, not certain how he ought to reply, not even certain what perversity the Count's "enjoyment" of the little female might involve. Rape seemed a physical impossibility, considering their relative sizes, but something hungry in Azimet's expression as he watched Eirena dance around the garden made Sir Simon feel queasy.
"The old man is a foreigner," added the Count. "He cannot speak any language but the northern tongue, and that most barbarously. Not from your own homeland, I should think, but a native of Wäldermark, by his accent."
"Indeed," said Sir Simon casually, to conceal his suddenly burning interest. "I visited that principality some years back, in the province of Marstadtt . . . or perhaps it was Wiemarchen." He pretended a vague confusion. "I had no idea that they grew the females so small there."
The Count's eyes glinted at this pleasantry. "Nowhere in the world, so far as I have been able to ascertain. It appears that Eirena is utterly unique."
He might have said more, but just then one of his black Oranian slaves appeared, announcing that the Oligarch had come to call.
"You will excuse me," said the Count, rising to his feet. "My interview with the Oligarch is not likely to be a pleasant one, and I would prefer to conduct it privately."
After the Count withdrew, Sir Simon remained for a long time, leaning with his hands on the marble balustrade, contemplating the oddly matched pair in the garden below. Then, with a sudden decision, he descended the stairs and approached the gnarled figure by the pool.
"Mr. Braun, your servant," said Sir Simon, in their common language. The old man gave a visible start and rolled a panicky eye. "I beg your pardon. Do I have the name wrong?"
"You've the name aright," said the old fellow heavily. "No need to beg my pardon. It was just sommat in the way you said it . . . made me think maybe we'd met afore."
"I cannot claim a previous acquaintance," said Sir Simon. "And yet I feel as though I do know you. Your young kinsman, Jedidiah, is a most particular friend of mine."
The old man began to quiver, to cast uneasy glances around the garden. "Who—who was it as sent you?" he whispered hoarsely.
Sir Simon smiled. "The Glassmakers sent me, but not in search of you," he said—so kindly and gently that the Count, had he heard him, would have been surprised. Indeed, his entire manner had altered, as though one man had left the terrace and another man arrived in his place down in the garden. "Mere chance brings us here together. Or perhaps I should say: the inscrutable will of the Fates. You have nothing to fear from me. I wish you only well."
Caleb Braun digested that for a moment. "My grandnevvy Jed—you said you knew him?" he asked eagerly. "Whatever become of Jedidiah? I've worried about that boy, but there weren't no way . . . no safe way anyways—"
"Exactly," said Sir Simon. "But Jed, I have reason to believe, is a good safe distance from those who might harm him. As for yourself, Mr. Braun . . . I beg you will forgive me for speaking plainly, but my affection for your young kinsman motivates me. I know that you have an extremely dangerous enemy in the person of Thomas Kelly, but I wonder if you appreciate that you have, in some sense, merely escaped the frying pan to enter the fire. Count Azimet is every bit as dangerous as the sorcerer Kelly."
"I know that well enough," said Caleb. "But the Count has taken a fancy to my little daughter. If we got powerful enemies, it stands to reason we need a powerful man like the Count is to protect us."
As if in response to her "father's" unease, the dainty creature had abandoned her game, and wrapping her arms around Caleb's knees, she rubbed her tiny face up against his legs.
Sir Simon took silver snuffbox out of his waistcoat pocket—the box was a fanciful receptacle, shaped like a fist, with an obvious lid at the top and a secret catch at the bottom. He took out a pinch of snuff, eyeing the old man with a great deal of exasperation. The presence of Jedidiah's granduncle in Zammarco (still more, the totally unexpected existence of little Eirena) brought complications he had hardly reckoned for.
Sir Simon inhaled, sneezed, and dusted off his fingers. It would be nearly impossible to save a man who had no desire to accept his protection. He could only hope that he would be able to arrange things in such a way as to spare his friend's old uncle the full force of the coming catastrophe.
***
During the frustrating days that followed, days which Sir Simon devoted to further and equally futile investigations, he found many opportunities to speak privately with Caleb Braun, and to improve his acquaintance with the mysterious Eirena. She had taken a liking to him, and came running whenever she spotted him, but the old man remained adamant, for all Sir Simon's repeated warnings and persuasions.
"I appeal to you as Eirena's father," said Sir Simon, on one such occasion, going down on one knee beside the tiny creature, reaching into his pocket, and bringing out a silver ring which he slipped on her wrist like a bracelet. He had fallen into the habit of buying small gifts for her. Eirena rewarded him with an enchanting smile. "I cannot believe that any man would wish to place his daughter under the protection of a voluptuary like Count Azimet."
"Aye," said Caleb, maddeningly calm. "I know all that, the Count and his nasty habits. But you can be sure I make precious certain she don't witness nothing she shouldn't. She's beyond his reach, anyway."
As to that—though his imagination continued to balk—Sir Simon entertained some uncomfortable doubts. But Caleb repeated the old argument: They were safer here at Azimet's palace. No, he could not be convinced to take Eirena elsewhere, even if such a thing were possible.
Uncertain how far the old man's loyalty to the Count extended, afraid he had said too much already, Sir Simon did not dare to tell him: should his own mission here prove successful, the Count's protection would no longer hold.
It was not that Sir Simon troubled himself much over Caleb Braun and his probable fate. He would scarcely break his heart over the stubbornness of one misguided old man, his kinship to Jed notwithstanding. But Eirena was another matter.
Even on closer acquaintance, he could not fathom the origin of the tiny creature, nor begin to guess at her age. Though formed like a little woman, she apparently could not speak, and there was a freshness about her, a childlike quality, that Sir Simon found oddly moving.
As the days dragged by, Sir Simon gave more and more thought to Eirena and her plight. What her fate must be, in the event his investigations proved successful, and she was confiscated by the State along with the Count's other property, he did not like to think. That she would be regarded as property—perhaps even put on display as a freak of nature—was highly probable. Her inability to speak or otherwise clearly communicate must relegate her to the status of brute beast, at least in the Exalted Republic of Zammarco. And while the idea of Eirena continuing to live under the Count's roof was insupportable, a public exhibition struck Sir Simon as patently obscene.
If forced to it, I shall simply kidnap her, he finally decided.
The New Year passed in a blaze of glory, a multi-colored swirl of activity. On the eve of the holiday, on the night known as Sundark, preparations began a little before midnight. In every house, every shop, every church, every palace in the city, lanthorns were shuttered, candles, lamps, and fires quenched. Then, precisely at midnight, the bells in all the churches rang out at once, announcing the advent of Sunreturn. Then men carrying rekindled torches, boys carrying colored lanthorns, ran through the city until sunrise while the bells continued to peal.
At Co
unt Azimet's palace, the entertainment continued well past sunrise, with comedies, tragedies, and impromptu operas performed by a troupe of traveling players.
A little before noon, the Count sent for Sir Simon, by way of the Oranian page-boy. The youth bowed so low that his outsized turban almost touched his toes, as he relayed Count Azimet's message.
"It is time we had a little talk," said the aristocrat, sitting propped up by pillows in his enormous four-poster bed. At Azimet's command, two naked black girls who had shared his bed crawled out from between the covers, gathered up their skimpy costumes, and went off to perform their ordinary duties below stairs.
Sir Simon felt a familiar sickness claw at his stomach, though outwardly he remained impassive. How old were these girls? Fourteen? Fifteen? Yet by the laws of Zammarco there was no such thing as the rape of a dark-skinned female.
"I did not know," said the Count, watching him closely, "that you numbered kidnapping among your many accomplishments."
Sir Simon stared at him, in obvious bewilderment.
"My spies," said the Count, "have been conversing, most persuasively, with agents of the Duchess of Zar-Wildungen."
"Ah . . . that little matter," said Sir Simon, thinking quickly. "But yes, I was employed, some while back, to spirit away two young women in whom the Duchess took a certain interest. I do not know why that should surprise you."
"It does not," said Count Azimet. "But I am somewhat puzzled to learn that the Duchess's agents continue to dog your footsteps, as if expecting you to lead them to the young women in question. Or can it be that you chanced to form a sentimental attachment to one of the ladies?"
A tiny frown appeared between Sir Simon's shapely eyebrows, his nostrils expanded. "We will not speak of that, if you please."
Count Azimet laughed. "Now you have surprised me. Can it possibly be, my friend, that you are a man of honorable principles?"
"When it pleases me to be so. Or quite the opposite, when that serves me," retorted Sir Simon. "My principles can be remarkably flexible. But I can assure you: I am not, in general, inclined to be sentimental about females."
The Count leaned back against his pillows. "Or anything else, Sir Simon?"
"Or anything else," said Sir Simon, smoothing out a minute wrinkle on the sleeve of his coat. "I wonder that you should ask. Could it possibly be, Count Azimet, that the spies you have sent to investigate me found anything to my credit?"
"Not at all," said Azimet, his eyes crinkling at the corners. "You seem to be a man without a single redeeming feature. For which reason, I am much inclined to employ you, at the first opportunity."
"You relieve my mind," said Sir Simon, sketching a bow.
But of course the Count had not relieved his mind in the least. Sir Simon realized that his time was growing perilously short. Once Count Azimet sent him off on some larcenous mission, he would cease to enjoy free run of the palace, and his investigations must end.
It was solely due to a fortunate accident the next afternoon that Sir Simon stumbled on the solution to his problem—and in the last place where he had expected to find it.
He had just entered the salon adjoining the ballroom, the same gilded chamber where Count Azimet had received him on that first night. As he approached the fantastically ornate fireplace, he felt a blaze of energy at his breast. Something had activated the lead talisman dedicated to Sadrun, which he wore on a ribbon around his neck, between his black cambric shirt and brocaded waistcoat.
Concealing his surprise, Sir Simon turned with his blandest smile to answer a question the Count had just addressed to him. Yet all the while, his mind continued to spin busily.
For the past fortnight, he had expected to find some secret closet, some sliding panel, in one of the rooms where only the Count, his intimates, and his most trusted servants had access. That the hiding place should open on so public a chamber as this one . . . that was astounding. And yet, in some sense, the very publicity of its location provided a safeguard. As did, also, the gaudy ornamentation which repelled the eye.
Sir Simon listened with one ear to Azimet's most recent amorous exploits, while all the while his mind was busily at work. During the day he could never examine the fireplace and the wall around it, for fear of interruption. By night, it would be risky to come downstairs where he had no business to be, now that the holiday revels had ended. For if the Count's servants should discover him at his work and overpower him . . . Sir Simon impatiently dismissed that thought from his mind. He must simply see to it that he was not caught in the act, or if he was, to be prepared for that.
Much later, when the palace was dark and quiet, Sir Simon stood in his own barely lit bedchamber preparing for his mission of stealth. He slipped a loaded pistol into his belt, a slender stiletto up one black sleeve. He knew full well that discovery would mean the utter failure of his mission, but still he might hope to elude capture if he went armed. In his pockets, and sewn into the linings of his coat and waistcoat, and even in the hollow three-inch heels of his shoes, he always kept a number of useful items. Sir Simon preferred to be prepared for any eventuality.
Unfortunately, a need to move quickly and silently meant that he must leave his shoes behind. He twisted the heels, one after the other, and the fuses and tiny bottles of explosives dropped into his hands. He disposed these, as conveniently as possible, elsewhere on his person.
Absentmindedly, he reached into his coat pocket, drew forth the silver snuffbox. Flipping open the hidden catch, he took a pinch of the fine crystalline powder that he kept inside. Then, realizing what he was about, he shook his head, dusted off his fingertips, and closed the box.
He needed to be alert tonight, aware of every sound and movement. Even a tiny pinch of the Sleep Dust would rob him of that sharp edge. With his craving for the drug unsatisfied, his senses were already becoming painfully keen, and soon his lungs would burn, his heart race, and his pulse become tumultuous, but that extra keenness might well save his life. It would be many hours before his failure to take the drug would begin to debilitate him.
Light-footed and agile in his stockinged feet, he made it from his room on the third floor all the way to the salon off the ballroom without any serious incident—though once he was forced to dodge behind a marble statue, to avoid being seen by the Oranian page, and once slide under a low table, to avoid an encounter with another servant.
He closed the double doors behind him, took out a reel of wool roving, which he proceeded to lay against the crack at the bottom to block the light. Then he paced his way in the dark across the room, found the candles he had observed earlier on the mantelpiece, lit them, and began his search.
Using his lead talisman as a pendulum, dangling it on the ribbon and observing its movements, he located the sliding panel beside the fireplace. But this would be no ordinary secret panel, not for Count Azimet. It would be a panel operated by an elaborate mechanism, a devious combination of mechanics and magic. It was the magic, of course, that had activated the pendulum.
Sir Simon knew he must proceed with the utmost caution. Any small mistake in operating the mechanism would either set off an alarm or else spring some deadly trap. Yet the more ingenious devices of this sort were invariably the work of gnomes—and gnomes took such delight in mathematical puzzles they could rarely resist the temptation to include them in everything they made.
He took down one of the candles, drew back a pace, the better to observe the frescoes on the walls, the ornamentation of the fireplace. It was a little-known fact (which Sir Simon knew quite well) that gnome traps and alarms nearly always contained in their design a series of mathematical clues which the canny observer might actually decipher, and so learn to work the mechanism.
Sir Simon proved to be a canny observer. The fresco, he realized, offered several clues, and it was also useful to carry (as he did) a compendium of favorite gnomic equations around in his head. In half an hour, he had deciphered the puzzle, made a touch here and a touch there, twisted an orna
mental molding attached to the mantel, and stepped aside just in time to avoid the expected trap: a six-inch needle that flew through the air heart-high, and buried itself in the opposite wall.
Then the secret panel slid aside, revealing . . . not the hidden cupboard he had been expecting, but a room fully half the size of the salon. Sir Simon ground his teeth, disgusted by his own stupidity. Had he thought to make a thorough investigation of this part of the palace, he must have noticed, long before this, a disparity between the dimensions of the salon and the sizes of all the surrounding chambers.
But he had no time to waste on useless self-reproach. Picking up the candle he had placed on the floor behind him, he stepped through the panel and entered the room beyond. What he saw there amazed and dazzled him, a treasure trove beyond compare, a library of rare and ancient volumes, and a museum of diabolical artifacts.
Half an hour later, after a thorough investigation, Sir Simon left the secret room convinced of one thing at least: he had finally succeeded in providing a noose large enough to encompass Count Azimet's neck.
CHAPTER TEN
In which Sir Simon is obliged to face the Bitter Truth.
A sleepy Don Balthazar Onda, clad in a rich brocade dressing gown and sporting the turban he always wore to bed at night, received his unexpected visitor in his study. "You choose a late hour in which to call, my friend," he said, yawning and not best pleased by this nocturnal intrusion.
"A thousand pardons," said Sir Simon, though he did not sound in the least apologetic. "But I have uncovered a plot of such magnitude . . . it seemed best to bring the matter immediately to your attention."
For a moment, Don Balthazar had the unnerving sensation that a perfect stranger was staring at him out of Sir Simon's eyes. The thought was a fleeting one, swiftly banished by the import of Sir Simon's words. He removed his turban, ran his fingers through the short hair necessitated by his heavy senatorial wig, and sat down behind his desk. "You have obtained the evidence you sought? But this is splendid, my very dear sir! However," he added, with a wry smile, "I do not think that a call on the Oligarch and the other gentlemen of the Conclave would be advisable at this hour."
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