I let another great line slide.
As we strolled the hallway in Tama's wake Tinnie remarked, "You're learning."
"Huh?" Wasn't I?
"You've stopped sticking your foot in every time somebody opens a door a crack."
"Did I miss something?"
"I doubt it. But if you did, so much the better."
Pain is a great teacher, darling.
Tama went out onto the same high porch where she'd awaited us. We joined her in time to see Marengo North English's coach arrive. Armed horsemen accompanied it. They were ragged. Bandages were common.
Somebody loved Marengo. A military-style honor guard turned out. So did a haphazard medical team.
How bad had it gotten? There was no smoke over the city so folks hadn't started burning each other out yet, but if there were many casualties, it could turn nastier fast.
Clearly, the fun had gone out of dressing up and bullying the neighbors.
An ugly little devil-worm of a word wriggled through the muck in the pit of my mind. I hoped it didn't get out and infect these guys. They were in a mood to embrace the demon.
Its name was War.
On Marengo's estate, where there were no pesky nonhumans to make them look bad, the members of several Call freecorps sparkled, though guys with different armbands seemed to have scant patience with one another. Did they fight each other when nobody else was handy?
The medical crew whisked North English out of his coach, onto a stretcher, headed for the house fast. From where I stood Marengo looked like a genuine casualty.
Up close he was grimly pale, like he'd lost a lot of blood. He was still leaking. His clothing had been destroyed by people eager to patch him up.
He was awake and aware. He frowned blackly when he saw me. His gaze jerked to Tama suspiciously. Tinnie joined me. North English's suspicion faded. He knew about us.
What was his problem?
Tama fussed over North English. Sounded like she meant it, too.
It wasn't necessary to fake everything in the deal she had.
She moved with the litter, spewing orders. She knew what she was doing. She'd had practical medical experience sometime.
The Pipes crowd seemed accustomed to the presence of mysterious strangers. Nobody questioned us. We were with the boss's woman. He'd seen us himself and hadn't had a stroke. We must be all right.
I did have to field questions about my shoulder ornament. Fortunately, the Goddamn Parrot kept his beak shut. I didn't have to explain how I'd become a ventriloquist. Unfortunately, none of those bold young warriors were in the market for a pet. "Think what a wonderful mascot he'd make," I said. "Put him on your standard and have him squawk insults at dwarves... "
The bird squawked an insult at me. It was incoherent but it was there.
Few of the returnees were alert. Mostly they just flopped down somewhere and closed their eyes, safe for the moment.
I remembered that from the islands. After a long, hard, emotionally draining fight, the moment we felt safe we surrendered to exhaustion by collapsing on the spot.
I picked a guy who didn't look as beat as some. "What happened?"
He focused on me momentarily, remembered seeing me with Tama. He shrugged. "Somebody tipped them off. I thought it was gonna be the great big ole hairy-assed mother first night of the Cleansing. I thought we was going to hit the skells and skuggs everywhere, all at the same time. Not just The Call and Theverly but all the groups and freecorps."
That's what they were doing at Weider's the other night. Slapping the last coat of paint on their plan. Using a joyous occasion to mask the stir of darkness. "So somebody leaked it, eh?"
"They was waiting." Like that said everything that needed saying. Misfortune hadn't robbed him of his sense of humor, though. He observed, "Ogres is bad in a street fight."
"They are hard to dent. I speak from joyless experience."
A blond character, shorter and younger than me, born with a board strapped to his back and a chip on his shoulder, stalked into the morning light. He spotted Tinnie, used her as a landmark by which to locate me, came over. "You Garrett?"
I confessed.
"The commander wants to see you."
"North English?"
"Is there another?"
"I'm new at this. I thought maybe Colonel Theverly—"
"Follow me, please."
I did. I caught Tinnie's hand as I passed her.
78
Tama was working on North English when we joined them in a room reminiscent of Max Weider's study—though this was much larger. If the weather turned bad, the freecorps goofs could hold their maneuvers indoors. A world of plotting could be managed from there. The gloomy nether reaches contained maps hung above sand tables boasting miniature structures that looked familiar.
Two guys with spears for spines and no imaginations were camped between us and the tables, I guess in case I suffered one of my outbreaks of curiosity.
Good to see they trusted me as much as I would've had I been the old boy getting mummified. "Sir," I said as the officer and I approached, "you wanted me?" He looked less determinedly antagonistic now.
"Tama says you came to see me." His voice was weak and high but stronger than I'd expected. He winced as Tama swabbed an abrasion. Naked to the waist, he was a pasty, doughy sort of man.
Also a lucky sort. He hadn't been treated kindly. He had suffered cuts and stab wounds and bad abrasions most men couldn't have survived.
I said, "I wanted to bring you up-to-date." He lacked enthusiasm. In his position it would be hard to be enthusiastic about anything less than life itself.
I edited my story only slightly. If I was being followed, my movements were no secret. Anything I'd learned, if I'd learned anything, could be learned by others. There was little point holding out. And none to revealing that I was reporting to Block and Relway, too.
I was up to the centaurs. "They were a military unit. Disguised but definitely veterans."
North English waved a hand. "Wait a minute." He pushed Tama away.
I waited while he ordered his thoughts. That took a while.
"Let me get something straight. You had no idea The Call would begin the Cleansing last night?"
"Not a glimmer. But you're the only one I know who'd know about it. You didn't warn me."
"But you're generally well informed and a keen observer. You would have noticed anything obvious." He seemed to be having trouble thinking.
"I thought so myself."
"If you didn't notice, then it wasn't something we did that gave us away." My guess was, he'd just realized that he had a rat in his walls. "Tama. Miss Tate. I want to chat with Mr. Garrett privately. Ed. You and your men step out with the ladies."
Ed was the officer who had delivered me. Apparently body-guarding was among his duties. He was scandalized. "Sir, I wouldn't recommend—"
"Do it, Ed."
Ed stopped arguing.
Tinnie didn't want to leave, either. Tama didn't want to leave. They did not argue. Marengo North English was in charge.
I chuckled. "You got Ed worried, boss."
North English frowned at my familiarity. "Possibly. And that's my fault. He took the same attitude yesterday, I told him to go away—and I ended up lucky to be alive."
"How bad is it?"
"I told you, I was lucky. Damned lucky. They meant to kill me but a gang of dwarves looking for rightsists to fight popped up and attacked them."
"I'm confused," I confessed. "Maybe you started in the middle. Dwarves saved you? From human attackers? Why would they do that?" It was interesting that terror and pain would put him into such a talkative mood. But why with me?
"They didn't recognize me. And the men who attacked me were disguised as members of the movement."
"Maybe they were."
"Possibly. That's not a thought I cherish. But I do have rivals. Although I don't think any of these men were that because I didn't recognize any of them. Even so, I did want Ed and the others out of here so we could speak freely."