Sweet Silver Blues gf-1

by Glen Cook

  Fate had us overhaul Binkey's Sequin running up the Leifmold channel and I cut a deal with Master Arbanos even before we made the quay. He was vastly amused to see me saddled with Rose and Tinnie again.

  We laid over three days in Leifmold, waiting for Master Arbanos to offload a cargo of army supplies and take on twenty-five tons of smoked cod. Morley split his time between getting fat eating green leafies and keeping Rose too busy to get into trouble. The triplets sold one of their unicorn horns and went on a toot. I think Vasco spent his time thinking about doing himself in. The rest of us just waited, with me lending a thought or ten to my routine once we reached TunFaire.

  I still had to get myself and my associates paid.

  55

  We tied up at Sequin's place on the TunFaire waterfront late in the afternoon, which pleased me to no end. Eager as we were to escape the smell of fish and visit old haunts, there were things Morley and I had to get done before our return became known. Keeping control until sunset was less difficult because it was only for a short time.

  After hard dark fell, we all trooped off and slithered around the city's back ways to the back door of Morley's place, where everyone and everything, willing and unwilling, went into temporary hiding. I sneaked off to get some advice from the Dead Man while Morley worried about how he was going to consummate his arrangement with the kingpin.

  He had asked Saucerhead and me to be his bodyguards when the meet went down, for which he would "gladly pay your standard fees—as soon as Garrett delivers me my wages for the last couple of months." I figured he had delivered above and beyond the call, if mainly to save his own hide, and I could do him a favor in return. Saucerhead signed on because he'll do any damned fool thing as long as he's getting paid.

  I swear I did not know what he was going to pull.

  The Dead Man acted like I'd just stepped out half an hour ago and had just given him time to work into a comfortable snooze before I came clanging and banging. After having fulfilled his reputation for being cranky, he asked for my story. For five hours I gave it to him. He didn't interrupt often as he didn't need more information for anything. He thought my precautions against getting stiffed by Willard Tate would prove needless, but supposed they would hurt nothing. We talked tough at each other a little while I cleaned up around there, then I hightailed it back to Morley's to grab thirteen winks before I walked into the Tates' den.

  News from the Cantard was all the talk when I got back. You miss a lot when you're traveling.

  It seemed that when all the armies and half armies and whatnots had turned up at Indigo Springs for the big soirée that would determine who kept the water hole, Glory Mooncalled was gone. Without a trace except a friendly note to the Venageti warlords on his list.

  I liked the guy's style.

  I was grinning when I went to work on the Tate gate by dawn's early light. "I'll get a little of my own back here."

  A sleepy apprentice finally opened up. He was too addled to recognize me.

  "How's the arm? Looks good. I need to see the old man."

  "It's you!"

  "I think so. Last time I looked it was world-famous me, back with the goods from the wars."

  He dashed away, which is something people don't ordinarily do, yelling all the way. I closed the gate behind me and waited.

  I have to admit that Willard Tate was a lot sharper at that hour than I will ever be. By the time the kid led me in, there were steaming cups of tea set out. His first words were, "Sit down. Breakfast will be ready in ten minutes." He looked at me expectantly.

  I set my accounts down beside my tea, got comfortable, took me a sip, and said, "I've got her. Tinnie and Rose, too. If you want them."

  That old man was downright spooky. He glanced at what I'd placed on the table, considered my choice of words, gave a nod that said he understood the situation, and asked, "What is she like?"

  "Like nothing you ever imagined. Like nothing I ever dreamed, either, even in a nightmare."

  He reached for the accounts. "May I?"

  I pushed them toward him.

  "Tell me about it while I'm looking at these."

  The version I gave him was more tightly edited than the one the Dead Man had gotten, but I didn't leave out anything he needed to know. To say he was surprised would be putting it mildly. To say he took it all well would be understating. The short version took two hours and skirted the worst behavior of females surnamed Tate. I think he caught wind of what I left out, though.

  When I finished, he said, "I've checked and you have a reputation for being honest with your expenses. Bizarre and substantial as these are, I suppose they're justified. Considering."

  "The advance covered almost everything but salaries," I informed him. "Between us we're maybe a hundred out of pocket, mainly because of the cost of bringing the girls home."

  Tate grunted, shoved the accounts back. "You'll have the balance before you leave."

  "And my executor's fees?"

  "That's in the hands of the probate. When can I expect delivery?"

  "Tonight. But very late. Probably after midnight. I have to help Morley with something first." Morley's business had gotten lost in the editing.

  "All right. I guess it will have to do." Then he let me in on why he was being so understanding. "Would you be interested in taking another job? After you've recuperated from this one?"

  I raised an eyebrow.

  "You know the major portion of our business is army boots. The most expensive component of a boot is sole leather. Army specs require thunder-lizard hide for soles. We have our own contract hunters and tanners, trustworthy men all. I thought. But of late the shipments have been short."

  I saw where he was going and shut him out. I had turned out to be crazy enough to go into the Cantard, but I will never be the screaming sort of psychotic who goes into thunder-lizard country. Besides, I'd made myself a promise never to leave TunFaire again and I never break a promise to myself without my self's prior permission.

  I let him talk. When he ran dry I said I would give it a think and got the hell out with my expense money, knowing I would shriek a big "No!" the second I had my executor's fees in hand.

  56

  Morley had set his meet on wooded creekside ground at the boundary between the real world and the high city of the dukes and barons and stormwardens and whatnot. It was a place often employed for such encounters. Any uproar, as might be caused by treachery, would bring an army of high city protectors down on everyone.

  Over the years the formula and etiquette of a "brookside" have become fixed. As proposer, Morley set the time of the meet and the size of each party. He picked an hour after sundown and four people. It would take four of us to lug Valentine's coffin. Dojango, Saucerhead, and I would back him.

  The kingpin, on agreeing, got to pick which end of brookside was his, and could come early if he wanted, to check the grounds for signs of treachery. Morley was not permitted an early survey.

  The kingpin agreed to meet. An hour after sunset I was helping carry a coffin uphill, into a situation that seemed to me to be of no special value to either of the principals. The kingpin's reputation said he was good for his word. If he'd made promises to Morley, he would keep them. I couldn't understand why he had agreed to the meet—unless his hatred for Valentine had overcome his good sense.

  Morley Dotes was a tough and tricky independent, known to be in need of money, and TunFaire boasted a dozen men willing to pay large sums for the kingpin's life.

  We went up with Morley and Dojango in front, me and Saucerhead in back, so we bigger guys got most of the weight. We parked the coffin carefully. Morley stayed beside it. The rest of us fell back ten steps and kept our hands in plain sight.

  After a while a shadow left the poplars opposite us and came over to Morley. "He's in the box?"

  "Yes."

  "Open it."

  Morley lifted the lid carefully from the foot end.

  "Looks like it could be him. Hard to tel
l in this light."

  Morley slammed the lid shut. "Go get a torch, then." He kicked the coffin. "This guy isn't going anywhere."

  The kingpin's man went away. I hoped Saucerhead and I were back far enough not to be recognized. I was getting a bad, bad feeling.

  There was some talk in the woods. Then somebody struck a spark. A torch flared.

  Saucerhead said, "Let's get out of here, Garrett," and began backing up. I noted that Dojango had already vanished. Morley was easing away from the coffin. I drifted with Saucerhead, got myself behind a nice bush. Tharpe kept going. Morley held up about five feet from my side of the box.

  The kingpin and his troops marched up. "Open it," said the boss of bosses. One of his boys got the job done.

  "Gods. He looks weird," another said.

  The kingpin asked, "What did you do to him, Dotes?"

  Morley replied, "Nothing. He did it to himself."

  "Right." The kingpin tossed Morley a bag. Major gold, from the sound when it hit Morley's hand. "We're quits, Dotes." And then the boss of bosses just had to do it. He just had to bend down for a closer look.

  "You're right," Morley said. "You're absolutely right."

  A bone white arm shot up. Unclipped claws closed in the flesh of an exposed throat. A fanged mouth rose to feed, the smell of blood bringing the fever on the monster so powerfully it could think of nothing for the hunger.

  The kingpin's bodyguards started to do their jobs.

  I started to make tracks.

  Morley passed me before I'd gone a hundred yards. He was chuckling, which made me even angrier.

  We had one hell of a blowout about it, and it might have gotten violent if Saucerhead hadn't been there agreeing with everything I said.

  It was the talk of the morning, the vampire found surrounded by four dead men, feeding, so gorged it couldn't defend itself when the uphill protectors arrived. They hacked it to pieces, then burned the pieces and coffin on the spot. They threw the victims into the fire, too, just to make certain the infection didn't spread.

  We were in the clear. But that didn't alter my attitude toward Morley.

  Meanwhile...

  57

  Meanwhile I made a delivery of females to the Tate compound, as fine-looking a set as ever I have seen. A pity they had so many nonvisual defects between them—though I meant to see Tinnie again.

  Tate at the gate, mate. Actually, as Dojango would say, Tates at the gates, mates. About fifteen of them, including the old man himself. Such huggings and kissings and tear-sheddings and backpattings. "I am amazed, Red," I said when a lull in the action gave me a chance to get a word in to Tinnie. "You'd think they were glad to see you guys." Tinnie was getting two-thirds of the attention, but that left plenty for Rose.

  Only the old man remained aloof. When the crest of the storm passed, he forced his way to me and asked, "Where is she, Mr. Garrett?"

  "On the wagon."

  He looked. He saw nothing but the box. "You've got her in a coffin?s"

  "Did you pay any attention at all last night? She can't go wandering around in her condition."

  "All right. All right." Suddenly he was a very nervous, irresolute little man.

  "Come on, Pop. You're doing all right. Get some muscle to do something useful. You did get a place ready?"

  "Yes." Now he was my old aunt, wringing hands. Kayean had become an important bridge to the son he had lost.

  When you looked at it up close, you kind of had to feel for Rose, the living child whose return he hadn't bothered to acknowledge. Maybe she thought if she got her hands on all that money he would notice her.

  "Don't expect a lot, Pop. She can't do much but sit and stare at things nobody else sees. And probably just as well." He didn't know about Kayean and me before Kayean and Denny. I was not the boy to clue him, but I did admit, "I've got an emotional investment here, too. I want you to know something. You try any fanciness, you treat this woman less than perfectly, and you won't have to worry about boot soles and thunder-lizard hides anymore."

  I got a little too intense. He backed off and gave me the look you give the nut on the corner preaching that pixies are the secret masters and if we don't do something they're going to run off with our sisters and daughters. Then he formed a crew of cousins and apprentices and got the coffin moving.

  He had done a room, all right. Nary a window, and as light-proof as you could get. One very pale, consecrated candle burned on a mantel over a fireplace before a large mirror. A very black, very huge, very fat, very wrinkled and very old woman sat to one side, the tools of her trade on a table beside her. I recognized her. The Mojo Woman. Mama Doll. TunFaire's leading authority on the diseases of the undead.

  Maybe I owed somebody an apology.

  A couple of the boys got in ahead with sawhorses. The pallbearers deposited the coffin. Mama Doll moved her bulk like it was all the work in the universe. First this part of her, then that, then another, got under way, like the sailing of a ship of a thousand parts. Before anyone could mess with the coffin lid, she slapped a hand down right above where Kayean's would be folded over her heart. She rolled her eyes and mumbled to herself for a minute, then backed away and nodded.

  While the boys unfixed the lid, she grabbed protective amulets from the table. A big lead-up to a big anticlimax. When they lifted the lid, Kayean did nothing but keep on sleeping.

  I had to go shake her to wake her up.

  It was evident Kayean was in control and safe to be near.

  "Out!" Willard Tate ordered. "Everybody get out!"

  Relatives and apprentices hurried. Mama Doll moved at her usual lugubrious drift. Garrett stayed where he was.

  The boss turned on me. "Out!"

  "Move me, Pop."

  "I can call the boys."

  "I can break both your legs before they get here."

  "That's enough," Kayean said, her voice little more than a whisper. She touched my arm. "Wait outside." A ghost of a smile touched her lips, light as a moth's kiss. "I can break his legs if he asks for it." Her touch was slightly heavier, her voice softer. "Thank you for still caring."

  And the boy Marine was alive again.

  Only two things you can do in a situation like that. Be a goof or get the hell out.

  I got.

  There was light outside when Tate left. He was a wrung-out, exhausted old man. He found me blocking his path. In a hurried mumble meant to get it over, he told me things.

  Kayean was going to stay where she was for a while. Part of her inheritance would be used to buy a home and part invested to create a living so she would be free of worries when Mama Doll declared her cured. Of the rest of the fortune she wanted ten thousand given to Vasco and the remainder divided among Denny's other heirs.

  So Rose would make out after all.

  "She is in and of the family, Mr. Garrett, by virtue of my son's love for her. You need not be concerned for her. We Tates take care of our own."

  "I guess you're all right, Mr. Tate. Thanks." I stepped aside.

  He limped off to his bed.

  She was lying on the bed, cold and corpselike in the light of the lonesome candle. But at least she was in a proper bed and not laid out in that goddamned coffin. I collected the room's only chair and positioned it silently.

  I stared at her for a long time, wrestling with the kid Marine. I touched her hair, which had begun to show a hint of color. When I could stand no more, I rose, bent, and brushed those cold lips with mine for the last time.

  I headed for the door.

  I heard a sigh. When I glanced back, she said, "Good-bye, Garrett." And smiled a real smile.

  I never slowed down.

  I went and wrapped myself around a barrel of beer.

  Each year, on the anniversary of the day I brought her out of the nest, a courier brings a package. The gift is never niggardly.

  I know where she lives. I never go up that way.

  58

  The probate coughed up my fees four days after I
delivered Denny Tate's heir. I got in touch with Tinnie. The redhead and I did some celebrating. She was along when I went to visit the Dead Man.

  She invited herself and she made it stick. Redheads are stubborn witches.

  She looked at his place and said, "It's a dump, Garrett."

  "It's his home."

  "It's still a dump. How do you feel?"

  "Almost broke. And kind of good about myself."

  "Smug self-satisfaction, I'd call it."

  "Come on. Try your witchcraft on him. See how far it gets you."

  He woke up the way he always wakes up. Cranky. Garrett. Again. I demand that you cease your infernal pestering. Then he noticed Tinnie. What is that creature doing here? He has no use whatsoever for females of any age or species, an attitude I find too parochial. But there's no convincing him, and I doubt there would be even if he was still alive.

  I tolerate too much from you, Garrett. I reap the gall-ridden harvest of my indulgence.

  "You're going to have to indulge me a lot more now, Old Bones. Or you might find yourself camped in the street. You're talking to your new landlord here."

  After half a minute, he asked, You bought this place? You spent the money from the Tate business on it?

  Ah. That genius still worked. "Yes. Call it an investment in my future. The pestering has just begun."

  For the first time in our acquaintance I had caught him without a comeback. The silence stretched.

  I started the housekeeping while he stewed.

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  Document ID: 75c1956b-848f-4ef4-9ec5-c2ed175d22c8

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  Document creation date: 31.05.2008

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