"Guards?"
"If I was Charisse I'd be surrounded with them and I'd have a laser in each hand." She frowned at his untouched wine. "Get that down-it'll do you good."
"I can manage without it."
And what it could contain. She smiled, guessing his thoughts, and reaching for the glass swallowed its contents. Proof only that she had introduced nothing lethal into the wine.
As she set down the glass she said, "Earl, I'm leaving tomorrow. I've a chartered vessel and it'll leave as soon as loading is complete. There's room if you want to come along."
"To where?"
"Souchong. I'm delivering there." Her fingers lingered on the bandage. "Just think about it. Help yourself to wine while I get your clothes."
They were damp but clean and he dressed, ignoring the pain from wrenched muscles, the throb of the cracked bone in his forearm.
As he slipped the knife into his boot she said, "Well? Have you decided? Will you ride with me?" Without waiting for a reply she added, quickly, "No strings. No demands. You can pay if you can afford it or work as a handler if you're broke. I want nothing you're not willing to give. It's just that I hate to see a good man wasted. God knows there are few enough of them."
And few women who would offer help as unhesitatingly as she had. Dumarest stepped toward her, halted, lifted his hands to touch her cheeks, the palms resting lightly against her ears as, gently, with no trace of physical passion, he kissed her lips.
"Earl!"
"You have my gratitude," he said. "Now increase my debt by telling me where to find Charisse."
The place was filled with murmurs, soft susurations which hung like ghosts in the air; words uttered and relayed to be amplified and distorted by corners and angles and long galleries of wood carved into a multitude of shapes. Beasts and reptiles and things from dark places which seemed to watch with jeweled eyes and move at the edge of vision to freeze when stared at directly. This illusion came from the subdued lighting which left the upper parts of the corridors in shrouded darkness.
Dumarest paused as sound increased to turn into words slurred with intoxication. Enrice Heva, late leaving the party, calling a farewell to Corm. One tinged with bitter envy.
"Sleep well, my friend-if Glenda will let you. And remember, my dear, if he bores you I shall be waiting."
Her reply held the brittle indifference of a wanton.
"Wait on, Enrice. I'll try not to let it worry me."
"Bitch!"
"Old goat!"
"That's enough!" Krantz called a halt to the exchange, his voice breaking to echo in fading, reverberations. "Tomorrow is another day and remember our decision. We all agree-"
The thread of sound died, cut by a closing door, the soft thud of the panel a sonorous drum in the whispering silence. A trick of acoustics turned the stairwell into a whispering gallery. An accident or something created by design. Had Armand Chetame stood at its head listening to the unguarded comments of his guests? Did Charisse?
Dumarest reached it, looking upward, seeing only a spiraling band of pale luminescence. Illumination seemed controlled and directed as was the rest to leave the upper layers in shadow.
He wondered at the absence of guards.
Linda Ynya had warned him against them and he had expected to find them but, as yet, he had roved unchallenged and unmolested along the passages and past the blank faces of endless doors. A search at random; the woman had not been able to tell him where Charisse was to be found.
"I swear it, Earl," she'd said. "I'm only a guest here, remember. A business acquaintance. She could be anywhere or not in the building at all."
A hope he didn't share but if Charisse was absent he could still find the library and, with luck, the secret it might contain.
But, first, the woman.
He moved on, halting as fresh murmurs echoed from the air. Deep masculine tones gave orders barely discernible and Dumarest placed his ear against the paneling to gain clearer definition. A waste, the contact resulted in a total loss and when he backed and cocked his head the murmurs had gone.
Up?
Should he go higher?
He moved on, stepping carefully on the treads, his shoulders prickling as if they were the target for watching eyes. The house was too silent, too deserted, the lighting too odd. There should have been servants if not guards but he had seen no one since leaving Linda's room. Heard nothing but vibrating echoes. Had she given the warning after he'd left?
A gamble he had taken and one he had calculated to win. She had delayed him but for obvious reasons and he had been willing to spend time in relative safety. She had confessed her attraction, had a chartered vessel ready to leave and was willing to give him passage.
He opened a door and looked at shadows broken by points of brightness; reflections from assembled equipment set on benches. The pressure of a switch brought them into sharper distinction; microscopes, constructs of glass and metal, the blank face of a machine covered in a host of dials. A laboratory? Armand would have worked in the house before the main laboratories had been built. His study? If so the library could be close.
"Raske!" The tone was deep, one he had heard before in a fading whisper, now coming loud and strong from the passage outside. "Take up position here and keep alert. The man is armed and dangerous."
"I know that, sir."
"Don't forget it. Levie has a broken skull and Epel's spitting blood. Both are lucky to be alive. The next time he might kill." A pause then, "I'd better check the doors."
Dumarest had killed the light at the first sound and now he leaned against the panel, fingers searching for the latch. He found it, slid it home as something pressed on the panel from the other side. The guard or his officer-who was unimportant. All that mattered was that he was trapped.
He turned as the pressure ceased to check the room in closer detail. The place was totally dark, no light coming past the edges of the door or from any gap below. A check he made before again switching on the light. A minor risk compared to the noise he would make if he stumbled against one of the glass fabrications. At the far end he saw a window and made his way to it while searching for other doors. One pierced the wall to his left and he opened it to see a multi-drawered cabinet lining one wall. A bench held delicate scales, containers, flasks and other equipment he guessed was used for the measuring and weighing of exact amounts. The cabinet would hold a range of chemical elements and compounds. The flasks to one side in padded racks held acids and other fluids. Everything was clean, free of dust and sparklingly bright, but he gained the impression that none of it had been used for some time.
The room had no door, no window and he stepped back to the main room. The window was curtained and he carefully slipped beneath the fabric, opening the pane to check outside. On the ground lights shone, beams flickering from side to side revealing the figures of men and animals. One of the dogs reared, looking upward, small whining sounds coming from its throat.
A moment and Dumarest had closed the window, setting the curtain back into place. A glance had been enough; the wall was sheer, even if he'd been willing to tackle a climb again the lack of holds made it impossible. That and the dogs and men watching from below.
Quietly he paced back to the door and crouched, ear against the panel, listening.
One guard? More?
If so how would they be placed?
He remembered the passage, the doors, the stairs he had climbed. One there, certainly, if the commander knew his job. One at the far end of the corridor-but why one outside this door?
Coincidence?
Or did they know he was inside?
Dumarest straightened, spine prickling with a familiar tension, the deep-rooted primitive warning of danger which he had learned never to ignore. Treading softly he crossed to the inner room and propped the door open with a chair. A switch released a flood of illumination, brilliance which dulled as he wrapped a cloth around the globe. Another chair and some odd items of equipment draped with the curtain from the window made an indistinct shadow against the cabinet. Back at the door he killed the light in the main room, released the catch and lifting a heavy flask he'd taken from the inner room hurled it at the window.