by Glen Cook
31
Katie's dad wouldn't let me in. Katie was home but he refused to tell her I wanted to see her. He didn't like anyone male, liked anyone interested in his daughter even less, and me least of all. I've never been real good on any musical instrument so I couldn't get her attention with a serenade. Grumping, I stood around in the street wondering, "What now?" I could wander over to the Tate compound and see if Tinnie was talking to me this week. I could try a couple of other young and incredibly attractive women of my acquaintance, though it was getting late of a workday evening to be turning up on anybody's doorstep. Or I could go somewhere and hang out with other guys like me—dateless and not wanting to stay home—and pay five times retail price per mug of Weider beer not bought at home by the keg.
Laziness and a long lack of the companionship of men who remembered drew me toward Grubb Gruber's Leatherneck Heaven. Which is as fat a misnomer as the one that used to hang on Morley's place back when he called it The Joy House. Grubb's joint isn't exactly a pit of despair where lost souls go to drink in solitude, perhaps in search of oblivion, certainly nurturing a sad pretense that camaraderie might break out at any moment. But you don't hear a whole lot of laughter in there. As the evening progresses the reminiscing turns inward, private, and maudlin, to memories that as individuals we cannot easily share. And I'm always surprised when there isn't any of the whimpering and screaming that had so often come around in the darkest hours of the night, down in the killing zone.
When those memories come, and somebody in Gruber's place starts wrestling with them, somebody else will hoist a mug and summon a ghost. "Banner-sergeant Hamond Barbidon, the meanest mortarforker what ever... "
And the cups will rise up. And ten thousand ghosts will rise with them.
"Corporal Savlind Knaab."
"Lance Fanta Pantaza."
"Andro Pat."
"Jellybelly Ibles."
"Mags Cooper."
And each name will remind somebody of another. "Cooper Away, the best damned platoon sergeant in the Corps."
Plenty of men would be prepared to dispute that because everybody remembered a particular sergeant who brought him along. The sergeants are the backbone of the Corps. And if you lived very long out there you grew up to become one.
Chances are you never heard of any of the toastees because they'd fallen in different places and different times. But they were Corps, so you honored them. You remembered them and you wanted to weep because those people out there in the street didn't know, didn't have any idea, and already, just months after the long war's end, were beginning not to care.
Sometimes it isn't that difficult to understand why the really ugly, militant, racist veterans' organizations have so much appeal for men who survived the Cantard.
Nobody who wasn't down there will ever really understand. Not even those who shook our hands when we left. Not even those who welcomed us back with mighty hugs and no conception whatsoever what it was like to sit there watching the life bleed out of a man whose throat you'd cut so you could go on, undetected, to murder some other poor boy whose bad luck had placed him in your path at the wrongest time possible in the entire history of the human species. So that someday, somewhere far away, some woman would cry because she no longer had a son.
I decided that what I wanted was to spend an evening at Grubb Gruber's place. But, apparently, I never arrived.
32
Eventually a moment came when I was rational enough to realize where it was that I was regaining consciousness. Guess who was looking down at me with an unhappy glint in his eye? I croaked, "We godda sta dis romance, Morley. Wha da my doin' here?"
"I've been hoping you could explain that to me, friend. The evening is just getting started. I've got some swanks from the high ground down here slumming, carpeting the floors with silver. Then you burst in, obviously not part of the entertainment. You're all torn up. You have blood all over you. You have a snarling ratman hanging on your back. You crash through three tables before you collapse. Five minutes later I'm standing here watching you leak all over a Molnar rug because all my customers have abandoned me and I don't have anything else to do."
I tried to get up. My body wouldn't respond. I'd used up my reserves talking, evidently.
Morley looked up as his man Puddle entered my field of vision. Puddle was about eighty pounds overweight and appeared to be about as out of shape as a man could be and still stay upright. He had a lot of miles on him, too. But looks are deceiving. He was strong. He was hard and he was tough and he had a lot more stamina than was credible for a man his size. He was dressed as a cook. He needed a shave.
"Need to shave, Puddle," I crooned.
I thought about going back to sleep. But I thought I probably ought to hear what Puddle had to say first.
Morley asked, "What did you find?"
"A long trail, a broken ratman and puddles a blood, boss. Da skink was a reglur one-man army."
"Corps," I said, not loud enough to be heard.
"And the ones who were after him when he staggered in here?"
"Split. Hauled ass out'n here da second we come out a da door."
"Reliance's gang, you think?"
"Not sure, boss. But dis's his part a rat city." TunFaire can be considered as many cities which occupy the same site. In some cases this fact is acknowledged publicly but in most the pretense is strongly in the other direction.
"No matter. We'll get the real story when Sleeping Beauty over there wakes up."
I managed to roll my head a short way. A ratman in worse shape than I found myself was sort of strewn around the floor ten feet closer to the front door, being stepped over and around by people cleaning up the mess.
Morley said, "Sarge, come give Puddle a hand. Get Garrett sitting up in a chair. Then we'll find out what happened."
Good. Good. Because I really wanted to know.
A second very large man, who could've passed as Puddle's tattooed big brother, appeared beside Puddle. Straining for breath, both men bent toward me. Each grabbed a hand. Up I floated. I tried to say something. What crawled out of my mouth didn't make sense even to me.
They dropped me into a comfortable chair. At least, it was comfortable under the circumstances. I wasn't yet quite certain what the circumstances were.
I had the uncomfortable feeling that I'd been on the losing side in a major brawl.
Morley said, "Somebody bring the medical box." The existence of which I noted. A fact that would weigh in on the other side the next time my good friend insisted he was completely out of his former underworld life. Which he might want me to believe because he thought I was thick with Colonel Block and Deal Relway. "Sarge, start checking him out."
Sarge is Sarge for the obvious and traditional reason. And, some think, for his tattoos, which let the whole world know that here's a man who made something of himself in the army. Here's a man who was tough enough and ferocious enough to have survived years of leading men in the witch's cauldron that was in the Cantard.
What that name and tattoos don't tell is what kind of soldier Sarge was.
Not many know, Sarge never brags. He doesn't look the type. But if he wanted he could stay drunk the rest of his life on drinks bought for him by other guys who'd been to and come back from the land beyond the far walls of Hell.
Sarge was a field medic down there. Which means he spent more time with his neck under the blade than did most of us. And during most of that time he couldn't have enjoyed the luxury of fighting back against the Venageti trying to kill him because he was too damned busy trying to do something to salvage something from amongst an overabundance of freshly mutilated bodies.
I tried to tell Sarge he was all right for a groundpounder. Almost an honorary Marine. Maybe he understood some of what I was trying to say because a sudden, horrible pain shot from my neck down my spine, through my hips and into my legs, all the way to my toenails. I believe I squealed in protest.
"He's been worked over real good," Sarge sai
d. "But not by nobody who was able ta do whatever he wanted. What he's got is da kin' a wounds and bruises ya see when a whole bunch a clumsy guys gang up on somebody what's fightin' back."
So I put up a fight. Good for me.
If I'd been worked over like a plowed field, then how come I didn't ache in places I didn't even know I had?
"Anything broken?" Morley asked.
"Nah. He'll heal."
"Damn!" Puddle observed. "An' here I was tinking we could finally grab us a break, assuming we could a caught dis ole boy... Oh, my stars! Da man his own self is awake."
Puddle is full of it. I consider him a friend even though he's always saying things like that. Because he doesn't just say them about me. You could get the idea that he wants to drown Morley and Sarge. In fact, he's always rooting for everybody to get out of his life and leave it a whole lot less complicated.
Morley leaned closer. "So what was it, Garrett? To what do I owe the pleasure of your presence this time?"
I croaked, "I don' know. Can' remember. Goin' to Katie's."
Morley gave me a dark, unforgiving look. He'll never forgive me for having found Katie first. Her impact on him is just as ferocious as it is on me. Which is hard to believe, considering how I start drooling and stammering whenever she comes around me and how much more practiced and slick Morley is when dealing with the obstinate sex.
"Maybe you got there."
Puddle got it and laughed his goofy laugh. Sarge asked, "Den how come dem ratmen was all over him when—" Puddle nudged him with an elbow, hard enough to loosen a lever or two somewhere inside his bean-size brain. "Oh. He caught da wildcat. Dat's pretty funny, boss."
"And maybe he didn't. That cat would've scared those mice away. So what's your game with the ratpeople. Garrett?""
I couldn't remember. But if ratmen did this to me there could be only one answer. "Singe. I guess."
"Reliance. The old boy does seem to be getting a little fixated on that particular subject. Don't you think?"
"I do t'ink." I had a strong feeling that Singe was becoming a major issue inside the world of ratfolk organized crime. Reliance was ancient for one of his kind. The up-and-coming youngsters must be getting impatient.
I tried explaining that to Morley. I faded in and out a few times before he got it.
"Bet you're right, Garrett. It isn't about Singe at all. Not really. And I think I know how to settle the whole mess. And turn Reliance into your best buddy while we're at it. Sarge, the rat's breathing just picked up. He'll be ready to sing in a few minutes."
"What're you gonna do?" With stalwart assistance from Puddle I was having considerable success at staying in my chair. My speech was clearing up some, too.
"I'll just remind Belinda that a broken-down ex-Marine named Garrett, with help from his ratgirl honey and a certain suave and incredibly handsome restaurateur, saved her sweet slim behind not all that long ago. I'll include some suggested topics for discussion with Reliance and his troops. Like the troops should leave the general alone. And the general should remember that he's indebted to you now, not the other way around."
"I don' like it."
"Of course you don't. You're Garrett. You have to do everything the hard way. Marshall. Curry. Help Mr. Garrett to a seat at the table in the back corner. And whichever one of you heathens has a little brandy squirreled away, I'd like to see a dram turn up in front of my friend."
Guys started looking for the apocryphal friend. The usual uncomplimentary remarks passed between Puddle and Sarge. I didn't think I liked the guy they were talking about very much myself. We needed to track him down and spank him.
Marshall and Curry turned out to be the young thugs Morley had brought along for the Cypres Prose chase.
Somehow, while Morley was away consulting his two weightiest henchmen, a beer stein brimming with spirits appeared before me. The smirk on the mug of the cook who delivered it told me it had been donated involuntarily from someone else's stash. Probably that of faux cooks Sarge and Puddle.
I am amused by the fact that none of Morley's guys share his tastes for vegetarianism and teetotaling. They respected him enough not to bring their slabs of dead cow to work with them, but a few can't, or don't want to, get by without a little nip of firewater now and again.
A few sips got my brain clanking along. Just well enough to make me wonder why I wasn't hurting as much as I ought to be. Those ratmen must've tried to get some kind of drug into me. And they must've had some success.
I didn't feel well but I didn't feel nearly as badly as I knew I would when whatever it was wore off.
Morley dropped into the chair opposite me, showing a lot of pointy teeth. His place was ready for business again. And, naturally, customers began to drift in.
Dotes said, "Bring me up to date on your adventures."
I could talk in fits and starts now, almost clearly, so I did. But I still couldn't tell him anything about what'd happened in the last few hours.
I noted that my cohort in delivering disaster, the ratman, had indeed been swept up and taken away. Some of Morley's less skilled waitstaff and kitchen help were not in evidence, either.
I'd say it wasn't a good evening to be a ratman foot soldier.
Of course, so far, it wasn't that great an evening to be me, either.
33
I wasn't seeing double from drugs or concussion anymore. I was doing that from the bite of a pretty good brandy. Suddenly, I spotted a couple of Katie Shavers coming in the front door, dressed to stop the hearts of celibate clerics and to start those of guys who'd taken up layabout duty in the morgue.
I gawked. And muttered, "One for each of us."
Morley said, "Excuse me?"
"What's she doing here?"
"Well... I believe she received a message explaining that you'd been badly mugged on your way over to her place. So make like you've got one foot over the line and she's the only thing holding you back."
"Not to worry. She ain't the only thing but as long as she's here on this side, I'm staying, too. Hello, darling."
Katie just kind of smiled and ate me alive with her eyes. Which is part of what Katie does so well. She doesn't say much, most of the time, but she's great to be with when she does. She has red hair, an all-time crop of freckles, and eyes that are a sort of gray-blue slate instead of the green you might expect. Nor is the red hair that brilliant shade that always comes with a difficult nature.
Conversations stopped while Katie walked the length of The Palms. Women punched or gouged their men. Yet for all that, Katie is not a great beauty—though not even a madman would try to make the claim that she's the least little bit unattractive.
What she has most is tremendous presence and animal intensity. Every minute with Katie is like a minute spent in a cage with a restless panther.
"You are in bad shape," she told me, like she was surprised to encounter the truth. Her voice husked, of course, yet managed to sound like she was going to bust out laughing any second.
I tried to tell her she ought to see the other guys. My mouth wouldn't form the words. The effects of the drug kept coming back.
Katie scooted a chair around beside me, sat down next to me, took my hand, and leaned against me. "Cure for most anything," I croaked in Morley's direction. And all was right with the world.
Morley nodded and drifted away.
After a long time purring I managed to get out words to the effect, "I tried to see you to apologize for getting tied up with my work but your dad wouldn't even tell you I was there."
"That's all right. I tried to see you, too. But Dean said you were out and he wouldn't let me in to wait."
And never mentioned the fact that she'd come around, either. "What time was that?"
"Midmorning."
Ah. I was out. But she wouldn't believe that if I told her because she knows my habits. If I defended Dean at all she'd decide that I must've been with somebody else. Sometimes her mind works in nonsequential directions, disdaining cause a
nd effect. "We need to get those two together."
"Who?"
"Dean and your father."
"That's probably not a good idea. The only thing they'd agree about is that they should keep us away from each other."
"You're right."
"I'm always right, darling. You need to remember that."
"You're right." They all are. All the time. Which means that there're really tens of thousands of realities all around us, happening all at the same time. Has to be, on the face of the evidence.
Which brings to mind a joke first told me by Winger, of all people, and by just about everyone else I know since. If a man speaks in the heart of a forest and no woman is there to hear him, is he still wrong?
Katie asked, "Have you been drinking?"
"Yes I have. A little bit. Medicinal brandy. But the reason I'm goofy is because the ratmen tried to drug me."
Morley returned now, accompanied by Marshall and Curry. The whole gang dragged me upstairs and put me away in a guest room, where Katie did her best to keep me awake while I was suffering a threat of concussion.
34
The Palms by daylight is a different world. As a soft light will flatter some women, so night and candlelight do wonders for Morley's nightclub. By day the cheap wall coverings and decorations that had upgraded the place from its former status as The Joy House revealed their shabbiness.
The Joy House hadn't been what it sounds like. It used to be the same thing it was now, just patronized by a different clientele. Lowlifes. Grifters and pickpockets and low-level professional criminals. Ticks on the underbelly of society. The Palms, on the other hand, caters to parasites able to afford new clothes. But the upscale appurtenances have begun to show wear.
I sat at that same back corner table sucking down herbal tea and trying to figure out if my head hurt because of the ratmen's drug, the brandy I'd consumed, or because various blunt instruments had thumped my skull in passing. It was a valuable exercise, in theory. If I could figure it out I could shun the causes in future. All I'd have to do is give up drinking or get a real job.