Only occasionally?
"Miss Contague will come as well."
What? Why get Belinda in here amongst the gentler lovelies? She was in one of her manic, deadly phases these days. People who had challenged her rule or who had just irritated her lately were finding themselves dead in alleys or turning up missing all over town—though, to Belinda's credit, she did restrict the mayhem to the realm of business. But when she got into one of these moods where she heard murderous commands in her father's voice inside her head I preferred to avoid tickling her interest in me. I had hopes that interest would fade into complete indifference eventually.
"You left out Shale and his pals?"
Mr. Thorpe and Miss Winger, too. This is neither a reunion nor a rogue's ball.
What was it, then? "Is Morley coming?"
I believe Mr. Dotes is arriving now.
Somebody banged on the door. Dean responded. Evidently he was so excited by the challenge of managing a real dinner that he was willing to assume his other duties without quarrel.
"Why?" I asked. I wanted the Dead Man's plan. He was up to something.
"Not much to do around The Palms," Morley said from the doorway. "Things are slow. Nobody wants to come out while that's going on." He inclined his head toward the street. The racket raised by a really bad marching band was winkling rotten mortar out of old masonry for half a mile around.
The less disciplined and crazier rightsist gangs were attempting to cash in on recent embarrassments suffered by Marengo North English and The Call. They were everywhere, day and night, often armed, usually in the biggest crowds they could muster, trying to appeal to the disenchantment swamping North English's troops.
In the short run the rightsist movement was on a roll. As the faintest of heart of the Other Races hit the road their stronger cousins became more cautious. Fringe rightsists were making themselves ever more menacing by riding the crest of a wave of fear not ameliorated by the relative restraint characteristic of The Call. But they were just more public, not more numerous. I thought the absence of The Call from the streets would hasten the collapse of the more marginal, radical, crazy factions. Without the image of The Call they couldn't maintain a credible camouflage of respectability, rationality, and patriotism. I was sure their popular support would evaporate.
I expected the whole rightsist mess to collapse within a few months. And I hoped recent emotional shocks were enough to keep Marengo North English from pulling himself together before it was too late to keep his curdle-brained brother idealists from stumbling over the precipice of chaos.
It amazed me that nobody agreed with me. Even the Dead Man seemed convinced that the madness could only feed upon itself and grow worse—instead of eating itself up.
The Other Races—those who hadn't yet run for the boondocks—contributed to the misapprehension with their bickering and finger-pointing. I'd bet Bondurant Altoona and his cronies were feeling pretty cocky about their chances of replacing The Call as the flagship goof troop. But all that would change. If I was right.
Strange thing is, the streets are actually safer today then ever before during my lifetime. Bizarre but true. Only the stupidest, craziest, most desperate crooks try anything with dedicated rightsists everywhere, making sure the rest of us humans live up to their righteous standards.
109
"Anybody remember to invite Pular Singe?" Morley asked. He couldn't resist a smirk. Like it was all my fault that the ratgirl had outsmarted us.
"I didn't invite anybody to anything," I grumped. "I don't have anything to do with this. Whatever this might be. It's the chubby guy's shindig. I just live here. I just own the place. I'm going to go up and take a nap while you all party."
Miss Pular has been invited.
"That must've been some trick." He was chairbound and could get word to her when I couldn't dig up anybody even willing to admit knowing her name during my infrequent outings? "She wouldn't come here."
"She'll be here," Morley crowed. "Count on it."
Which meant he was in on the Dead Man's scheme. Whatever that was. "She isn't your average rat, Morley. You couldn't trick her that easily. Anyway, we don't know that she had any luck robbing Tama Montezuma." And outstanding luck that would've had to be. Tama Montezuma was older, smarter, stronger, more experienced, harder and deadlier than the baddest ratperson around.
The hunt for the missing mistress was one undertaking The Call had not deferred. Marengo's snoops were everywhere. He had told them Tama had been the spy responsible for the failure of the Cleansing. And I would be amazed in the extreme to learn that he was wrong. Although sabotaging the Cleansing might not have been her primary purpose, she would've had to keep her changer allies posted and they would've jumped at the chance to embarrass The Call.
Morley showed me more pointy teeth than might one of Venable's babies after deciding that I'd make a nice snack. I knew Dotes meant to mention how disappointed Tinnie and Dean would be once I revealed my new infatuation with Singe. But he restrained himself. So I would owe a moment of charity when I got even for the Goddamn Parrot.
Dotes said, "She is smart, Garrett. You're right. And she's as cunning as a rat. But we've both had ample opportunity to discover that brilliance alone won't protect you from what you don't know. And what Pular Singe doesn't know is that the rumors she's been hearing are pure fairy dust."
"What rumors? How's she going to hear any rumors if she's hiding from Reliance?"
"Oh, we're counting on her being underground. If she is, she can't check out the stories."
"What makes me think something has been going on behind my back?"
Intuition tempered by experience?
"You're behind this? What're you trying to do to me, Old Bones?"
Make you rich? Right after we save you from your dread, terminal disease, of course.
"Ask a foolish question. What disease? I'm healthy as a horse—No, healthy as something decent and sane. A randy thunder lizard, maybe."
No one outside this house knows that. You have not been seen since the day you bearded Mistress Cardonlos.
"She'll come because she worships you, Garrett," Morley said, still wrestling with inner mirth. "She'll come because she won't be able to miss the opportunity to say good-bye. She'll come because, despite what she's heard, she doesn't really believe in this glob of carrion you call a partner."
"I don't call him a partner. He does. Far as I'm concerned, he's just—"
In the meantime Morley said, "Gleep!" and leapt into the air, goosed by the glob of carrion. He didn't come down. The glob was not amused.
I grinned some, enjoying his predicament. I wondered if I could get him to take the Goddamn Parrot back in return for my good offices in getting his feet turned back around below his head and maybe even on the ground. "Chuckles, I don't have a clue what you expect to accomplish tonight. Sounds like you've been spreading rumors that I'm dying. If I'm that sick, why do I want a bunch of people cluttering up the place?"
"You want to say good-bye," Morley said. Hanging bottom up from the ceiling like some kind of pretty-boy bat evidently didn't bother him much. "So you've asked some of the important people in your life to come visit one last time."
"The pain and despair must be overwhelming me. I can't remember why I'd invite Marengo North English and Lieutenant Nagit but not Saucerhead and Winger and Playmate."
All my minds will be employed fully. I will have no attention left to monitor and prevent Miss Winger's miscreances. Nor did it seem likely that invitations to your real friends would attract nearly so much attention.