The challenge struck hard. Donovan could almost see the fracture lines streak across the quartz of her resolve. He could almost see her crack; and he knew that the next words she spoke would be to abandon the quest.
“When we reach Siggy O’Hara,” she said. And Donovan waited for her to finish, but she only shook her head and turned away before she could weep, and retired to her own quarters.
VII. THE FREEDOM OF CHOICE
A certain freedom comes from the abandonment of obligation; a sense of boundlessness from the lack of bonds. So the remainder of the transit to Siggy O’Hara ran more carelessly than had the initial part. A kind of melancholy settled over Méarana’s playing, not only in what she played privately in their suite, but even in what she performed in the first-class lounge at Captain-Professor van Lyang’s request. A sweet sadness informed her choice of mode and tempo. Méarana, it seemed, had begun to accept the facts.
Except that Bridget ban’s death was not yet a fact, as the Pedant periodically reminded everyone. It was merely a reasonable abstraction from the facts that the Sleuth had drawn. Yet no one loved a puzzle better than the Sleuth and from time to time the scarred man found himself unwillingly wondering how that death might have come about.
Inner Child was just as happy not to know, because to learn it they would have to track the Hound to the end of her trail; and the closer they approached that end, the closer they would approach their own.
No, the best of all possible worlds was that Méarana resign herself to reality and abandon the quest. That would satisfy Zorba—and those who had offered the bribe.
There lingered, too, the possibilities that the Confederates had learned of Bridget ban’s objective, that they would not pay the bribe, that they would not leave Méarana unmolested. Donovan told himself not to worry over the future, although as the Fudir reminded him, the future was all that one could worry over. You may forget your cares, he told Donovan, not without a little satisfaction, but do not be so sure that those cares will forget you.
Meanwhile, he resigned himself to too much keening of the goltraí from the harper’s clairseach and to wondering from time to time why there had been three empty chairs at an imaginary table. He could see but three possibilities: That he had lost parts of his mind and had forgotten even which they were; that there were emergent fragments yet unrealized; or that the Pedant had been careless in imagining the boardroom. He settled on the third possibility as being the most comforting; but the Fudir reminded him, too, that while the truth set you free, it seldom did so in comfort.
And so they came to Siggy O’Hara, a world named after an ancient battle on Olde Earth, in which a Duke O’Gawa had defeated “Toy” O’Tommy. The very reasons, let alone the passions, of that battle had been long forgotten, but every local autumn, O’Haran nations staged mock combats in which fantastically armored reenactors fired off cannon and muskets and swung long, two-handed swords. It was all great fun and hardly anyone was ever killed. Scholars fretted over authenticity and thought the armor used was an anachronous mixture of ancient Yùrpan and Nìpný fashion. They doubted that the two original armies had painted their armor blue and gray, or even that they had worn turbans. But authenticity had never been a concern of the reenactors. It was an autumn celebration, a last carouse of color before dead winter.
The harper, the scarred man, and their servant Billy Chins left the “Hurtling Gertie” at High Kaddo Platform in the O’Haran coopers, and checked into the Hotel of the Summer Moon under their own names, there to await passage to Ramage on the upper curl of the Spiral Staircase, whence to Jehovah, and home. Far below them, the Siggy sun was a pinpoint, brighter than most and with a faintly crimson cast.
Harping was less iconic among the O’Harans than in most of the Periphery. In olden days, the system had been isolated from the mainstream and had developed its own peculiar traditions and musics. Only with the Opening of Lafrontera had history caught up with her. Traffic had coursed through from Alabaster and the older inward worlds, like the wave front of an explosion. The settling of Wiedermeier’s Chit, Sumday, and other worlds had been an unsettling period for the O’Harans. Long-standing customs had teetered and very nearly toppled. Though never as wild as Harpaloon on even a quiet day, Siggy O’Hara had afterward, tortoise-like, pulled in her head, and vowed that such times would never come again. Commerce with the rest of the League was tightly controlled by the “Back Office” of the McAdoo.
Days passed while they awaited a ship to take them to Alabaster and Ramage. None with open berths were scheduled, but Donovan visited the shipping office each morning in case new vessels had been logged on the Big Board. Most of Lafrontera was outside the Circuit—Siggy O’Hara was its outermost station—and inbound ships oft gave no notification other than swift boats dispatched down the roads ahead of them. Ships might arrive only hours behind their beacons. Not long ago, all traffic had operated that way.
While they tarried, a message caught up with them from Little Hugh, confirming that “Lady Melisonde” had contacted the tissue banks at Licking Stone, Bangtop, and there, too, she had obtained a duplicate of the files copied by Debly Jean Sofwari and “thank you for telling us about the science-wallah.” If that last had been intended sarcastically, it did not come across in the machine-printed code groups in which the message had been couched.
“You guessed right,” he told Méarana at lunch that day in the hotel’s restaurant. “Sofwari was on Bangtop while your mother was at home prepping. He went the long way ‘round and she tried to head him off.”
“Was he trying to evade her, or had they planned to meet?” the harper asked. “Thank you, Billy.” The khitmutgar had interposed himself between the station’s staff and his masters, taking the serving dishes from the waiters and spooning portions onto their plates.
“It’s Greystroke’s problem now,” Donovan said.
Méarana pursed her lips and dropped her eyes. “I suppose so.”
“That nogut, lady harp,” Billy said. “Pickny-meri always belong mama. No one-time never have em.” He screwed his brow a moment in thought, then said, enunciating very carefully, “Daughter, she belong always to mother. Never give up.”
“Billy!” Donovan said sharply. “It has already been decided.”
The khitmutgar cringed. “No beat him, poor Billy. Not Billy’s place, talk him so.”
Méarana looked sharply at Donovan, but said nothing. She turned to Billy. “It’s not final,” she told him, “until we board a ship. Donovan, what else did Hugh have to say?”
The scarred man’s eyes dropped to the decoded text. Gwillgi had been alerted and was asking questions on Kàuntusulfalúghy, in case they knew where Sofwari was. I could have done that, the Sleuth told him, if I had realized his importance earlier. Pedant stuffs his facts away like a magpie. I can’t reason from what I don’t know.
A poor workman blames his tools.
The scarred man’s fist clenched. Quiet! The both O’ youse!
And so before Donovan could answer Méarana—nothing of consequence—she had plucked the message slip from his hand and read it. “Maybe Gwillgi can learn something,” she said.
“He’ll learn that Sofwari never reconnected with Bridget ban. A blind alley.”