Where the hell was the boy now? Had he paid attention when I’d told him to go see the Dead Man?
‘‘If he didn’t, I’ll go see his mother,’’ I muttered. Reviewing some fond memories.
‘‘Whose mother? What are you—’’
‘‘Tinnie. Darling. Sweetheart. Light of my heaven whom I love more than life itself. If you don’t stop this shit . . . Do I come around, sticking my oar in and getting underfoot when you’re trying to work?’’
That woman is a multiple personality. Ninety percent of the time she is the absolute center of her own universe. But once in a while, if you crack her between the eyes with a big enough stick, she’ll step back from all-about-Tinnie long enough to look at something differently. Plus, I got to admit, the personality she shows me is one I pretty much handcrafted for myself.
‘‘I got it, Garrett,’’ she said. ‘‘I’m pretty sure.’’
‘‘Pretty, anyway.’’ She might have a clue, after all. She sounded serious. And she didn’t call me Malsquando. ‘‘So, thank you, Light of My Life. Now let me get on with my work.’’
A core problem was, despite her having known me for ages, from days when my chosen profession pulled both of us into far harsher, deadlier, and spiritually more dangerous places, Tinnie can’t see what I do as real work.
She doesn’t need to know, but I feel the same way, sometimes.
I do what I do mostly because it’s better than working for somebody else.
‘‘Hey! Saucerhead.’’
Tharpe gave up looking into the pit. He came alongside, courageously inserting himself between me and the redhead, apparently under the misapprehension that I needed help. ‘‘What you got, Garrett?’’
‘‘What I got is, I’m thinking I want to bail on this whole adventure for today. I want to head on home, talk it over with my motion-challenged sidekick, then get myself twelve hours in a real bed. Not to mention some of Dean’s home cooking.’’
‘‘I could go for some a’ all that my own self. But my boss is a prick. Ain’t no way I can get loose long enough to get some a’ that for me.’’
I disdained any reply. I couldn’t win.
He was laying the groundwork for some kind of extortion.
‘‘Attitude, Garrett,’’ Colonel Block said from behind me. ‘‘Everything depends on how people respond to a man’s attitude.’’
Everybody I know, given the ghost of a chance, piles it on, higher and deeper. Fanatically determined to make the world’s ills all my fault.
Sometimes you just have to walk away.
That’s what I told me as I headed west, leaving the World and its miserable environs to stew.
No one else walked away—excepting Tinnie, who stuck tight. The rest all kept on keeping on, doing what needed to be done.
I was going to hear it from the Dead Man. I was going to hear it from Max Weider and Manvil Gilbey, too. I might hear it from Alyx and her smoking crew. I might hear a little something from Colonel Westman Block and Director Relway, later. I might get the random admonitions from Dean, Tinnie, Tinnie’s niece Kyra, and even lovable, quiet Kip Prose. Hell, I might even hear it from my great-uncle Medford Shale before the final word got spoken. My acquaintances are a chatty bunch.
Let them bark. I had to step outside of events for a while. I had to have some time out to see if I couldn’t get something to add up.
The appearance of the freaky families of the Faction might have put a new spin on everything.
75
Singe opened the front door as I was about to let myself in. I told her, ‘‘Look what followed me home. You think I should keep her?’’
Tinnie shoved the back of her left hand under Singe’s nose like she expected the ratgirl to kiss it.
An air of abiding amusement suffused the house.
So did voices.
‘‘Do we have company?’’ Feeling stupid the instant I asked.
‘‘Yes. Mostly to do with business.’’ Getting in a dig, ‘‘You just missed Penny Dreadful.’’
No doubt because Old Bones told her I was coming. What had he had her doing now?
Tinnie observed, ‘‘You’ve really put the fear of Garrett into that little girl, Malsquando.’’
‘‘I can’t help entertaining a mild suspicion that Tate women are somewhere behind that.’’
Speaking of: A semihysterical peel of laughter came from the Dead Man’s room. That couldn’t be anybody but Kyra, Tinnie’s apprentice in the arts and sciences of heart-breaking. What was she doing here?
I asked, ‘‘What?’’
Singe told me, ‘‘Go on in. I’ll let Dean know you’re home.’’
The big, wicked grin Tinnie had worn while showing Singe the landscape of the back of her hand vanished. Dread replaced it. She was worried about her niece.
My Miss Tate was scared walleyed that the other Miss Tate might be just like her favorite auntie.
‘‘Ha-ha-ha,’’ I said, softly. ‘‘What goes around.’’ I stepped into the Dead Man’s room.
My arrival sparked a marked lack of hosannas.
I stopped so suddenly that my sweetie plowed into me from behind.
I was right. The airhead noises, still bubbling, came from Kyra Tate. Who had such a hold on Kip Prose that it looked like he’d never get away. Also on hand were Winger and the Remora. They seemed to be having a good time, too. There was a taint of beer in the air and an empty pitcher near every couple.
And Winger was letting her little man be himself.
Usually it’s like she has her hand up his behind, using him for a sock puppet. I mumbled, ‘‘Must be the wonderful compliance device at work.’’
Not so. These people are just happy. Good things have been happening while you were away.
‘‘Good to know not everything will head for hell in a handbasket if I’m not there to manage it.’’
Old Bones sent,You have not had a good past few days.
‘‘There’s the understatement of the decade, Chuckles. Take a peek in here and see how they went.’’
He helped himself to a big dollop of Brother Garrett’s days of misery, sorting bits for processing in various minds. The man is becoming melodramatic as he approaches his elder years. Garrett, these past few days have been interesting but do not qualify for a place in your worst one hundred.
Melodramatic? Me?
Meantime, Tinnie worked the crowd, making sure everybody got a good look at the backside of her left hand. I snapped, ‘‘What the hell are you doing, Red?’’
Dean forestalled her by bustling in with a huge tray way overloaded with finger food. Singe was right behind with a teapot and a pitcher of beer. My mouth watered. I forgot Tinnie’s strange behavior.
My right hand was headed for my mouth, loaded with something made of meat and cheese tangled up around a sliver of sour pickle. Miss Tate managed a left-handed interception. I growled, ‘‘Hey! I’m trying to eat here. I’m starving.’’
‘‘What is it that you don’t see?’’
‘‘Huh?’’
That aura of psychic—or psychotic—amusement spread through the house again. Sour old Dean managed a full-bodied chuckle.
‘‘My hand, Malsquando. Right there in your face. What is it that you don’t see?’’
I felt the abyss opening under my feet but I couldn’t help myself. I said, ‘‘I don’t see why you keep waving it in everybody’s face.’’
The girl has a little more tolerance for my density than I usually admit. She took a couple of deep breaths and counted to ten thousand before she told me, ‘‘That’s because there’s something missing, dear heart.’’
I grunted. That seemed safe enough.
‘‘There’s this man who’s going around telling people I’m his fiancйe. But here I am, totally naked of any of the paraphernalia. Not to mention, he never bothered to ask my opinion on the subject.’’
The abyss has no bottom. It goes right on down, all the way, right out of this world into others where men blissfully shove their feet down their throats. Would I run into some blind fool falling the other way?
I would’ve expected a little more moral support from my dependents. Theydo depend on me to keep a roof over their heads.