Gene Wolfe - Free Live Free

“They will come to power in ten years?”

“Much sooner, I think.”

Sandy rose. “I realize I’ve asked more questions than the three we agreed on, and I don’t want to wear out my welcome. Mr. Barnes, Ms. Garth, I want to thank you for bringing me up here. I know as well as you do that I couldn’t have gotten into this room if it hadn’t been for you. Mr. Stubb, you’ve come to my rescue more than once, and I appreciate it. Madame Serpentina, I know you never grant interviews, but you’ve given me one tonight and let me take a picture and everything, and I appreciate it more than I can say.”

The witch inclined her head graciously. Candy looked embarrassed, Barnes grinned, and Stubb snorted.

“I’ll go now, but I want you to know that nothing I’ve heard in here—I mean, nothing beyond what I myself was told—will go into my article.”

Stubb said, “I’m a good deal more worried about what you’re going to tell the cop. Do you want to talk to him?”

Sandy shook her head. “Not if I can help it.”

“Swell. According to what the bellhop said, he’s between us and the elevators; but this hotel’s built in a hollow square, if you know what I mean. Turn right instead of left when you go out the door, and you should be able to walk around the long way and get to them without passing his room. Will you do that?”

“Of course. But if I’m stopped, I won’t tell lies—I just won’t say anything. The courts may say the police can examine a journalist’s notes now, but they won’t find anything there I wouldn’t put in my story.”

“Good girl,” Stubb said. He opened the door for her.

Candy sighed as it closed. “Wow. That’s over. Ozzie, why’d you have to bring her up here?” She tried to cross her legs, failed, and settled for crossing her ankles.

Barnes shrugged. “She looked like she needed help.”

Stubb said, “Our friend Ozzie’s a soft touch. How was your fish?”

“Tasty, only there wasn’t enough of it, or enough beer. You want the rest of your sandwich? How about that pickle?”

“You can have them.” Stubb pushed his plate over. Barnes said, “It’s that cop that got hit with the ax, isn’t it? Sergeant Proudy, his name was. I let him in this morning—my God, it feels like a year ago.”

“We’ve all had a tough day.”

Her mouth full, Candy mumbled, “’S not over yet.” She swallowed. “Why’s he watching us?”

Stubb nodded. “You’re right, that’s the first thing we have to talk about. Anybody got any ideas?”

“Maybe they found out about Ozzie calling all those salesmen. I heard you and Ozzie outside the house through the busted wall. Maybe somebody else heard you too.”

“So what? It was just creating a nuisance, and if they wanted him they could pick him up. Besides, Proudy’s not on duty.”

“You’ve been taking lessons from the Wicked Witch of the West over there, Jim. There’s no way you could know that.”

“Nuts.” Stubb leaned back in his chair, removing his glasses and pinching the bridge of his nose. “I don’t know how she does it—or if she really does. But I know how I do it, and anybody willing to think for a minute could do it too. Proudy got it with the spike end of a fire ax. I saw it. He got stitches and bandages and so on. You saw that, in fact you helped. He may not be in a hospital. He may not even be lying down, even if he should be. But there’s no way in hell the Department would put him back on duty after that. Not today. Not tomorrow. Not till he’s pretty well healed up.”

The witch pushed aside her fruit and lit a cigarette. “You are right in what you say. But that is not the question.”

Stubb nodded.

Barnes said, “Let me try. What are we going to do about him?”

“That’s not it either,” Stubb told him. “Anyway, who says we have to do anything?”

“ Why ,” the witch said. “That is what we must discover, Ozzie.”

Candy was staring at the witch and Stubb. “All of a sudden it seems like you two are pretty close.”

“Yeah. I’ll tell you about that in a minute. For now, let’s get back to Proudy. Anybody got any more suggestions about what he might be up to?”

Barnes said, “Remember those women who came to see Mrs. Baker? Could he be working for them? And anyway, what are they doing?”

“I don’t know,” Stubb said. “When she told us all that, I more than half thought she was making it up, or blowing a couple of nosy neighbors into spy stuff. Now I don’t know.”

Candy asked, “You think he could be working for them?”

“No. Not working for them. But he could have got onto them, and he might have talked to the Baker woman for all we know, and be trying to cut himself a piece of cake. He’s on his own for sure, and when a cop goes on his own when he could be home in bed, he smells a promotion or money. Any of you a mass murderer?”

“Don’t try to be funny, Jim.”

“Okay, then it’s money. We’ll talk about that later too. Should we ring him up and ask what the hell? I’m serious. He’s in seven seven one, and all we have to do is pick up the phone and dial his room.”

“I’m for it,” Barnes said. “After all, we carried him in and got him patched up after one of his own men hit him. If he’s after us now, I think we’re entitled to some kind of explanation.”

“One in favor,” Stubb said. “How about you, Candy?”

“You know as well as I do that it’ll end up with me getting busted.”

“One against.” Stubb glanced at the witch.

“It seems to me we should know more.”

“One for later. Make that two for later—when I talk to a cop, I like to have something I can pry with. Later it is.”

The telephone rang.

Stubb reached for the telephone. The witch said, “This is my room. You may hand it to me.” He nodded.

Candy nudged Barnes. “You think it’s him calling us?”

“Yes,” the witch said into the receiver. “This is she.” Then, “Of course you are. I knew your voice at once. What is it you want?”

There was a long pause while the witch listened.

“No, I did not. I will not say I never call invisible powers, but I have done nothing to him … . Everything affecting human lives involves spirits. That is nothing. There are many other explanations … . I would suggest that you go home. It is very late—if this were summer, you would see dawn at the windows.” She hung up.

Stubb was leaning back in his chair. The light from the weak hotel bulb above the table showed how waxen his skin was under a dark stubble. “You going to tell us?” he asked casually.

Ignoring the cigarette that smouldered on her plate, the witch got out another and her gold lighter. The flame trembled ever so slightly.

“Later, maybe,” Stubb said.

“I will tell you now, if you wish. It was the girl who just left. She was curious about the policeman and went past his room after all. She said he came out and tried to question her, but she would tell him nothing; when she threatened to scream, he released her. She asked if I had laid a curse on him.”

“And you said you hadn’t. Why’d she ask?”

“I assume because he looked or acted like one who had been cursed. She was prolix, but she really told me very little. I gathered she thought him irrational.”

“Did she tell you what he asked her?”

“Only that he wanted to know if we were all here, and that he seemed to expect her to know who he meant by all. She described us, and he asked who else was here.”

“Swell.” Stubb sounded bitter.

Candy asked, “What’s the matter, Jim?”

“Well, for one thing, I didn’t want her to talk to him. She has, and she’s sure as hell told him something. You can’t describe four people without telling an investigator who’s listening a lot, just to start with, and who knows what else she told him? For another thing, now I’ve got some idea of what he’s looking for.”