Dixon took a step closer, and Grue took a step back.
“I just want ya to know that I offered to settle this proper. I was willing to let it all be forgotten, and it was you who turned me down,” Grue said to Gwen. “I just want you to remember that.”
All the construction had stopped and the woodies were staring. The rest of the whores were out too.
“I want all of you to remember that … when the time comes.”
Nine hours later Grue was still feeling the sting of his fall and finding more places where the mud stubbornly stuck to his skin. He was back in his tavern, the bear returned to his cave to lick his wounds and sharpen his teeth. He’d been there all day and much of the night, sitting, waiting, and thinking.
He sat at the table near the bar, trying not to look at the front door, thinking it must be like watched pots. It hurt to move. Grue wasn’t a young man and falls were chancy things. Nothing was broken, though perhaps his reputation had been bruised.
The story would have run like urine down a drainpipe. Grue has lost control of Wayward. Women push him around. His own whores shove him in the mud and laugh. He didn’t recall anyone laughing; no one had so much as smiled. If anything, Gwen had looked terrified when he hit the street, but that didn’t matter. They likely laughed afterward, and even if they didn’t, the stories would say they did, which made it so. He could have rallied his troops. Willard knew a couple of dockworkers he called Gritty and Brock-big fellas with big fists. The three of them would make a mess of Dixon. And if he was really serious, he’d call Stane-that man was crazy and would do anything for a bottle, a girl, and a blind eye. Dixon would pay, that was a promise he had already made to himself, but that was a present he could wait on.
Grue had other plans.
The candle on the table flickered and he noticed the tin candle plate-the only one left. He had it set out special.
Remembering not to glance at the door, he turned toward the bar and focused on the painting there. He had been looking at it a lot that day; it helped to calm him. The whole of The Hideous Head had been built from the scavenged wood and cannibalized parts of other nearby buildings. In that sense the Head was a genuine product of the Lower Quarter-a child of all that had come before-the bastard son of a dozen parents, disowned by all. The front door, which he refused to look at for fear it would never open, originally came from the Wayward and was still the best door on the street. The windows-the two larger ones that faced the front-came from a failed tailor shop. The smaller window, legend held, was ripped from the hull of a ship that ran aground off the Riverside docks. In these artifacts the tavern was a storehouse that preserved the history of the Lower Quarter.
That’s how Raynor Grue liked to see it. He had a tendency to decide what the facts were-made life easier that way. He could be a miserable old rotter who lived in squalor, preying on people’s vices, or he could be a reputable businessman living in a treasure house of artifacts and providing amusement to hardworking men. Both were true in their own way. Grue preferred the latter. Partly because he really believed he provided a needed service and partly because he knew this was as good as his life would get.
The Hideous Head predated Grue by more years than he knew, and much of it was a mystery like the picture of the lake above the bar. Painted on a panel of wood, it had darkened with the years so that now it appeared as a night scene. He had sat for hours staring at that painting, wondering how it got there, who painted it, but most often how he wished he could be there under that dark sky next to that lake. At times, usually after a minimum of six drinks, he could hear the lapping of the water and the honk of the geese that were so subtly suggested with two dabs of paint. The picture was only one of hundreds of the Head’s many curiosities, and over the years he added his own embellishments to mystify the next owner. The tin candle plate on the table was one of those. He’d bought ten from a visiting tinker on a night he was too drunk to be talking business. Nine had vanished over the years-stolen. The one in front of him was the last. He dug it out of hiding to help dress the place up.
He heard the drum of hooves and the snort of a horse and knew his invited guest had finally arrived. Of the fifteen or so regulars who kept Grue in business and the twenty-odd walk-ins, none rode horses.
“Willard,” he called across to the bar. “Bring that bottle I have inside the coin box and two glasses-the ones off the top shelf.”
The front door to The Hideous Head opened, letting in a burst of brisk autumn air that flickered the candle on the tin. Reginald Lampwick entered, sweeping his cloak in an effort to not get it caught in the door. He had on his wide-brim, tied tight under his chin, and a set of gloves that he tugged off one finger at a time as he scanned the tables. Spotting Grue, he strode over, his big boots thumping.
“Sir.” Grue stood up and dipped his head respectfully.
“Raynor,” Reginald said, never offering his hand. Grue didn’t expect him to.
Willard arrived with the bottle and glasses.
“I can’t stay,” Reginald said.
“It’s a cold night,” Grue told him. “Made colder by the ride from Gentry Quarter. It’s the least I can do.”
Grue went ahead and filled the glasses. He would drink both if Reginald walked out. He would need to. No amount of staring at a painting would help him if Reginald didn’t at least listen. Reginald looked at the glass but made no move to touch it.
“You have no idea what I’m about to say,” Grue told him. “But that doesn’t matter, does it? You don’t like me, and just coming here has you raw. You probably cursed me a dozen times already.”
“You underestimate yourself, limiting the number to twelve.”
Grue smiled. At least he had read the man correctly. “And over the course of your long journey you’ve decided whatever I say will be a waste of time.”
“The odds are in favor of such.”
“You can cause me a lot of trouble, sir. I don’t want to rankle you any more than I already have. Please, drink.” He indicated the bottle. “It’s the best I have. Got it off a trader up from Colnora twelve years ago. Had a fancy label with a picture of a naked woman on it that peeled off a few years back. It’s good and suitably expensive even for your tastes, I should think. If you drink and you like it, then your trip won’t be a total loss no matter what I say.”
Reginald picked up the heavy glass with a dainty pinch of two fingers. He sniffed first and then sipped. He remained stone-faced, which irritated Grue. The liquor was good-his guest could have given him that much.
Reginald said nothing, but he removed his hat and cloak and sat down. “So what’s so important that you insisted I visit your miserable excuse for a business?”
Grue tapped the window with the lip of his glass. “Your boss granted a certificate for the place across the street.”
Reginald looked, then nodded. “A woman named Gwen DeLancy applied for operation rights a week ago. A brothel, I believe.”
“A whorehouse to be run by a whore. Does that seem right to you? A foreign one at that.”
Reginald shrugged. “It’s unusual but not unheard of. I take it you’re not pleased with the prospect.”
“You’re damn right I’m not. Those tarts over there used to work for me.” Grue swallowed his drink, letting the whiskey burn a path down his throat, and then refilled the glasses. “I make profit from three things: ale, gambling, and women. Across the street is a third of my profit-more even, as the gambling hasn’t paid well lately.” This was a lie, but he wasn’t about to admit financial success to Reginald. Grue never cared for the Lower Quarter’s merchants’ guild and how they helped the city assessors determine taxes. Traitors, all of them. Being the ward’s inspector, Reginald was the worst of the turncoats and the less he knew the better.