The Djinn who delivered room service blinked in and out of the sitting room, pausing briefly only to hold out his hand for a tip. Massha was the first to emerge from her room.
"Do I smell coffee?" she asked.
I was already wrapped around a cup that was almost big enough. I shoved an equal-sized beaker toward her. The serving spell filled it to the brim. Massha grabbed it and gulped down half of the steaming liquid.
"That was some party," she stated. "My head feels like the conga line's still dancing through it."
"I have a hangover the likes of which I have not felt for sixty years," I admitted. "Maybe not since some friends and I closed down the bar next to the distillery on Tulla." I paused to remember past glory and compared it favorably with the present. "These Flibberites sure know how to party."
"Amen to that," Massha agreed.
Chumley staggered out. "Coffee," he grunted, sounding like Big Crunch, his nom de guerre. A cup or two later the veins in his odd-sized moon-shaped eyes receded, and he was able to resume his normal intellectual discourse.
"We ought to thank Moa before we head out," I suggested, finally able to face the pink omelettes and green ham in the covered serving dishes. "Good idea." Massha nodded. "I want to pick up a little present for Hugh. I saw some beautiful swords in the weapons shop. There was a gorgeously balanced silver-hilted hand-and-a-half that he could use for sword practice."
"I'm going to take half a day and browse the bookstores," Chumley added.
Another rap came at the door. This one sounded a hundred times quieter than the first one. Moa stuck his head in.
"Hey," I called, feeling expansive as my hangover began to recede. "C'mon in."
The Mall administrator looked a little tentative, nothing like the plucky little guy who had braved thousands of angry shoppers the first morning we saw him, or the same guy who had danced on the table with a Gorgon's head pinata about five hours ago.
"You had a good time last night?" he inquired.
"That was one hell of a blowout," I assured him. "You sure know how to party, Moa."
"It's been a pleasure, I'm sure," Moa replied, shaking my hand warmly. "We were grateful to have you ... Are you certain you won't stay here, just a little while longer?
"I'm sure," I told him. "Maybe do a little shopping, then hit the road." I eyed his uneasy demeanor suspiciously. "Why?"
"Well, we gotta little problem."
I had heard equivocation like that hundreds of times in my life, and the follow-up explanation was never good news. "What kind of little problem?"
"Oh, nothing big," Moa began. "Just that one of my guards just reported someone who looks like your friend doing card tricks in the atrium near Doorway A."
It took a moment for the words to penetrate all the way through the leftovers from a keg of Old Banshee, but my outrage meter pinned on overload.
"What?" I bellowed.
The sound of my voice brought Eskina running.
"But we got the impersonator," Massha interjected. "He's still in custody, right?" "He sure is," Moa promised us. "He's locked in a box in Will Call. No way he's getting out of there."
My headache came back full force. "So, who's out there?"
Moa let out a heavy sigh. "It looks like there's another copy of Skeeve's card."
The Ratislavan investigator looked horrified.
'This is a total perversion of the process," she gasped. "Rattila is even a greater villain than we knew."
A rumbling sound disturbed our conference.
"Excuse me," Moa apologized, and reached into his pocket for a globe.
Inside the glass sphere we saw Parvattani's agitated face contorting. Moa set it down, looking shocked.
"We got more sightings," he informed us.
"More sightings where?" I demanded.
"Everywhere," Moa sighed. "Captain Parvattani says he's dancing with customers at Doorway R, he's pulling rabbits out of people's hats in Atrium N, he's taking candy from babies in Corridor B. In other words, either your Rattila's shapechangers can either teleport, in spite of The Mall's magik that is supposed to protect against it, and believe me, we paid a lot of money for that spell system, five hundred gold pieces a month just to maintain it—"
"Or?" I interrupted him forcefully.
Moa looked smaller and more forlorn than before. "Or all of them can turn into Skeeve."
Chumley's and Massha's mouths dropped open. I felt outrage bubble up in me.
"No!" I bellowed. "I don't believe it. I will not stand for a dozen impersonators dragging my pa—my friend's name through the dirt. We are going to take down this out-of-town rat!"
We stormed out toward the nearest Skeeve sighting. Corridor B, a few blocks' walk from the hotel. An outraged crowd had gathered. Mothers comforted crying infants and toddlers, all of whom were pointing over their shoulders toward the jungle-gym climbing frame in the middle of the atrium there.
A squadron of Par's guards had the structure surrounded, firing stun-pikes through the bars. I'd given them a short course of basic training with the weapons, but evidently, I had forgotten to explain the futility of the circular firing squad. Several guards were out for the count, knocked unconscious by their own fellows' bolts.
Inside the playground I could see a shadowy figure bounding from one side to the other. I wasn't in the mood to wait for him to come out on his own.
"Come on," I gestured to my companions. We spread out and marched on the monkey bars.
The impostor had to know we were coming. The crowd noticed us right away, as you would notice a tank bearing down on you, and parted like the Red Sea.
"Nyah nyah nyah NYAH nyah," chanted Skeeve's voice.
My dander, already up, hit new heights. I lunged into the underhang of ropes and climbing poles.
WHAM! And promptly got a swing in the mouth.
I felt my teeth with my tongue. None were broken. The people who weren't comforting crying babies laughed at me. I snarled back at them.
Charging in was a miscalculation on my part. I stood back, my head ringing. I shouldn't have done it. That was dumb. I had not adequately scoped out the scene. That was my own fault. I was a better strategist than that.
My judgment was clouded. I was furious because when Moa had dropped the bad news on us I had been ready to go. I was done. I was out of there. I could imagine that Moa himself had suffered a setback, finding out that the ring of thieves plaguing his Mall was still as much of a nuisance as before. But I had come with only one task in mind: take out the Skeeve impersonator and go home. Success had been whisked out from under my feet like a rug, and the anger about that was making me careless. I stopped where I was and took a couple of deep breaths. Start over. Watch what the enemy's doing, not what you think he ought to do.
What he was doing was jumping out of the jungle gym whenever he saw a kid carrying a lollipop or licorice string go by. Light on his feet as the original Skeeve, he whisked out, snatched the good, and dashed back into his hiding place again. Chumley's assessment was that Rattila gathered power based on value of the stir that the impostors caused, one way or another. He must have been getting a big charge, so to speak, out of this performance. I beckoned over the nearest guard with braid on his sleeves.
"Hey, bellhop," I called.
"Yessir!" the kid barked, nearly knocking himself unconscious with a salute.
"Clear the area," I ordered. "Mr. Moa will back me on this. Get everyone away from here. Use force if necessary, but in two minutes I don't want anyone looking this way. Got it?"
The officer looked puzzled, but he obeyed. He pulled his crystal ball out of his pocket and gave the order. The guards, those of them still on their feet, reversed course and started shouting at the crowd to clear the area.