“A fine job, boys, a fine job,” I said, tossing away my smoke. One of Cosgrave's remaining soldiers, merciful or cruel, was ministering to those of Armadal's side that had only been wounded. “I couldn't have done it better myself.”
Cosgrave had blood on his hair and light in his eyes. These middle-management types, they get so excited about wetting their weapons, like a priest with his first whore. “I must admit, Warden, you worked it out neatly.”
“No thanks necessary,” I said, raising my hands and waving them, as if to forestall praise. That wasn't actually what I was doing, but Cosgrave could be forgiven for thinking so. “The beginning of a prosperous relationship for both of us, no doubt.”
“Yes, about that,” Cosgrave smiled at me, catching his breath and letting his killers catch theirs. “I'm afraid there's been a change of plans.”
“Really? How so?”
“As much as we appreciate your assistance in the matter, looking forward, it's hard to see how your continued existence would benefit the Consortium. You're too clever by half, and besides—I have people within my organization to reward.”
“But Cosgrave!” I said, rubbing one hand against the bristle on my scalp. “We had an agreement! Promises were exchanged! We shook hands!”
Cosgrave laughed, cleaned his weapon with a bit of rag. “It's a cold world.”
Coincidence mandated that it was at this exact moment that the door flew open. Outside was the cold, and the dark, and a handful of large, armed, unfriendly looking Valaan.
“Fucking frigid,” I said. “These are the Five Brothers, and they'd like to introduce you to the rest of the family.”
7
“I was always pulling for you, Warden, you know that,” the Wind Cock said.
I drank whiskey and nodded absently.
“But what could I do, a small-timer like myself? I'm as quick to wield a blade as any man,” emphasizing the point by searching for the hilt of his weapon beneath the table, though his swell of gut meant it took a while before he found it. “But I can't be expected to go up against the entire might of the Ballafleur Consortium, not all by my lonesome!”
There was no longer any such thing as the Ballafleur Consortium, with their leaders and most of their toughs in the ground. Well, dead at least, I didn't bother to dig any holes. There would be blood on the snow this winter, as the rest of the city fought over their operations, syndicate heavies dropping like flies. By the time the spring buds bloomed we'd be back to the usual uneasy peace, the victors having assumed the choicest cuts of Cosgrave's old empire.
And Low Town? Low Town would remain mine.
“Point being,” the Wind Cock said, “I was hoping things would work out this way. I mean, I always figured they would—the Warden, I tell myself, he's just as sharp as a razor, and it's darkest before the dawn, and you've always got a card up your sleeve, after all.”
I spent a few seconds trying to untangle the knotted strands of metaphor. “Your good opinion means the world to me,” I said.
He at least had the good manners to look chagrined. “Here's everything that I owed you these last eight weeks.” He let the purse fall loud on the table, metal ringing against wood.
I let it sit a while.
“It's all there,” he said, licking his lips. “Every copper. You can count it.”
I watched the last few droplets of whiskey run down the edge of my glass. “Thirty ochre,” I said finally.
“What?”
“There's a thirty ochre penalty for tardiness.”
Even the Wind Cock couldn't have been so foolish as to think he was going to walk out of the Earl that morning without paying some sort of indemnity. It seemed thirty ochres was still within what he had expected to lose, and he nodded, if not happily, at least vigorously. “Fair enough, Warden, fair enough.”
“And thirty for disloyalty.”
His shoulders shifted down another notch.
“And thirty on top of that, because I dislike you, and because I can do whatever I want.”
We had finally reached the point where avarice began to compete with self-preservation. “Warden, please—”
“Or I can tell the Brothers it was you that pointed them out to Armadal.” Of course I had been the one to get that pot stirring, but who was going to know that? So far as the Five Brothers were concerned the noontime sun shone bright out of my asshole, I'd be able to count on them for muscle for the remainder of my life. Or their lives, at least.
“No,” the Wind Cock said, looking like more like a corpse than usual. “No. Ninety ochres is...fine. Ninety ochres is reasonable.”
He'd spend the rest of his life paying me back those ninety ochres, plus the accruing interest, die with the balance in my favor. “Of course it is,” I said, smiling again. “I'm a reasonable man.”
Henri didn't stick around long after, nodding and bowing on his way out, leaving a trail of unctuousness like a slug does slime.
“Everything all right?” Adolphus asked, coming by to refill my whiskey.
“Same as ever,” I said unsmiling. “Same as ever.”
Read the Low Town trilogy
Low Town
(a.k.a. The Straight Razor Cure)
Tomorrow, the Killing
She Who Waits
About the Author
Daniel Polansky is the author of the Low Town trilogy and the forthcoming Empty Throne duology, among other things. He can be found in Brooklyn, when he isn’t somewhere else.
danielpolansky.com
@DanielPolansky
facebook.com/DanielPolanskyAuthor
Thank you for reading, rating, and reviewing.
A Drink Before We Die: A Low Town Short Page 3
