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"He arrived moments ago. Inasmuch as you were expected shortly, I settled him in the kitchen with a cup of tea." Not to mention with most of the meager supplies I'd laid in recently, I discovered.

Saucerhead seldom lets a polite refusal get between him and a free meal.

I settled myself. Dean poured tea. I asked Tharpe, "What gives?"

"Message from Winger."

"Really?"

"She needs some help." He had trouble keeping a straight face.

"I can't argue with that. What's her problem? And why should I give a rat's whisker?"

Tharpe snickered. "Her problem is she needs somebody to bail her out of the Al-Khar. Seems she got caught digging around inside a certain country home and couldn't con the Guard into believing that she lived there. In fact, they were on the lookout for a big blonde who might be able to tell them something about what had happened there."

"I love it. But how did you find out? You sound like Colonel Block."

"Block came around to Morley's place on account of he couldn't find you here."

"Why'd he want me?" I could guess. Some little question about events at the Tops.

"He said on account of Winger claimed you as her next of kin when they asked who to notify she was inside so she could make bail or get bribe money for the turnkeys or whatever."

"I see." Boy did I believe that.

"And I went up and seen her. She already got into it with some screw thought he ought to collect special favors. Broke his arm."

"They charged her with anything?"

Tharpe shook his head. "Relway's just trying to squeeze her about what went down. But you know Winger. She's gonna be stubborn."

"I know Winger. She's lucky Relway's in a good mood these days. Things are going his way." Bad weather and ferocious behavior by the Guard and secret police had calmed the riots. For now.

There would be more. There had been no good news from the Cantard, like a resumption of the fighting.

"Yeah, I told her. Probably won't even beat her much."

"Then let her rot. No. Wait. Here. Run a message for me. Ask Block if he'll warn me before he turns her loose."

Saucerhead took my money. "How come?"

"So I can meet her coming out and tell her what a hard time I had getting her cut loose."

"You're wicked, Garrett."

"It's the company I keep. Been learning from a master." I jerked a thumb toward the Dead Man's room.

80

I shut the door behind Tharpe, locked up, strode to the Dead Man's door. I leaned inside. He looked the same: big and ugly. "I did all right for a guy whose help is so bone lazy... "

I kept close watch. You were less at risk than you imagine. He puts thoughts directly into your head.

"After you started siccing the bird on me, maybe. By then I'd been through the hairiest part."

You understand that the Winger creature knew the Jenn woman and Cleaver were one , right from the start?

"Sure. And she knew you were snoring or she'd never have came in here to set her hook. She still has an angle. She thinks. Only Emerald was ahead of everybody, probably from before she ever left home."

Indeed . The female of your species, if at all presentable, is capable of manipulating the brightest of you.

"If that's her scheme. The Belindas and Maggies and Emeralds aren't that common, though. Luckily."

Far be it from me to note your eagerness to be suborned by such females .

"Yeah. But not far enough." In the other room the Goddamn Parrot started preaching what the Dead Man was thinking with one of his other minds. "Got to do something about that thing."

Somebody knocked. Once more you have the opportunity to keep your word.

Becky Frierka. And her mother, of course.

"Why should I be the unique truth-telling character in this part of town?"

As I went to the door the Dead Man sent, The quest for Eagle's hoard is vain. The burial cairn lay on a slope overlooking Pjesemberdal fjord. That entire mountainside collapsed into the fjord during an earthquake three centuries before my mishap.

"Really?" If anyone around today would know, he would. "Might have been handy to know that before. When you were watching so close."

Any adventurer who deciphers the sagas discovers the truth eventually . But so much blood gets spilled that the guilty dare not give warning to the world. He loaded that thought up with a cargo of amusement at human antics. But something unrelated leaked through, too. He was worried about the political climate. He had a stake in a tolerant TunFaire.

Details plucked from my mind didn't reassure him.

I pasted on my boyish grin and got to work. It took an effort to keep smiling. Becky's mother doesn't have a husband. She's actively screening candidates.

Couldn't have been a better time for my parrot to go berserk, for my houseman to show his mean streak, for my partner to be himself. Naturally, nobody cooperated.

I am nothing if not valiant in my efforts to do the right thing. Becky got her date, exactly according to terms.

81

Playmate was with me, trying to look fierce as a favor. So were Saucerhead and Winger, whom we'd collected from jail. Two weeks inside hadn't taught her a thing, which is why I had recruited my friends. I needed help getting Winger to go in the direction I wanted.

A couple weeks can make a big difference in the Safety Zone. Morley's place had a new name: the Palms. Scraggly palms in pots stood out front, already wilting in TunFaire's chunky city air. Street lamps had appeared. Elf-breed lads decked out like Venageti colonels stood by to handle horses and coaches, despite the time of day.

Playmate observed, "I don't think I'll feel comfortable around here anymore."

"That's the point," Tharpe said. "Dotes has got him some high-tone ambitions all of a sudden. No place here for the likes of us now."

I glanced at Winger. Still sulking, she didn't offer an opinion.

The interior of the Joy House had been redecorated to fake the inside of a lunatic's idea of some tropical shack. I've been to the islands. It didn't work. After Morley bustled us upstairs, so we wouldn't frighten the customers if any turned up, I told him, "There aren't enough bugs, old buddy."

"What? Bugs?"

"Tropical places got bugs. Bugs big enough you got to fight them for table scraps. Flies and mosquitos that'll hang you up in a tree for later. And lots of them."

"You can overdo atmosphere, Garrett."

"Bugs don't sell to the Hill," Saucerhead guessed.

Dotes scowled. Our presence made him uncomfortable. I hate it when people social climb. He asked, "What do you want?"

"Just a couple wraps on the Rainmaker thing. Winger's out, which you probably noticed. And all the trilogy books are accounted for, only somebody mutilated them. Which won't do them any good." And I briefed him on what the Dead Man had told me. Given their natures and acquaintances, these four would get the word spread. And people would stop following me around.

I'd begun to accumulate watchers again. I guessed the Venageti at the Tops had mentioned my visit to someone who cared.

Pained, Morley asked, "Seen the girl?"

"Vanished without a trace. Gone treasure hunting, I presume." I hadn't tried to find her.