Mayer Alan Brenner - Spell of Intrigue

“It is always better to start with a spiritual message,” the Speaker said, after the vocal hum had subsided to the level of a few scattered whispers, “before we get down to the serious business of ripping each other to shreds over matters of principle.” That occasioned a ripple of nervous laughter, which the Speaker allowed to run its course. “Yumun Pondwater has been nominated as the chaplain of the day. Let us all give him our attention.”

The invocation was innocuous enough, with a brief parable saying allegorically that things usually work out, at least for someone, under the divine inspiration of the gods; Groot rated it as neutral for his side. Then the Speaker rose again.

Set into the base of the Speaker’s cylindrical lectern for its occupant to stand on was an axle-mounted foot-plate disk, which this particular Speaker sometimes liked to use for dramatic punctuation. He employed it now, letting himself revolve around through a full circle to cast his gaze across all the Councillors who surrounded him. Then, with a click Groot was close enough to hear, he engaged the brake and came to a sudden stiff halt. “We are convened today,” he said, “on a matter of gravity.” They were off.

The Speaker himself ran through a quick précis of the basic facts: Groot’s arrest, the seizure of property, his request for a hearing in Council; an evenhanded presentation. After this preamble he moved directly to the issue. “Who stands to accuse?”

The man who had visited Groot as the representative of the Bank of the New Dawn rose, looking somewhat ill-at-ease. “This is not a matter of accusation per se, your honor,” he said. “We firmly protest against this proceeding on -”

“Identify yourself,” said the Speaker.

“Mark Lizzard,” the man said reluctantly, casting a look over his shoulder toward the entrance door.

“Are you representing yourself, Meester Lizzard?”

The burst of laughter brought a slight cringe out of him. “The Bank of the New Dawn,” he said. “As a question purely of the conduct of business, this -”

The Speaker rapped the Mallet of Presidium sharply against the lectern surface. “Thank you, sir. Will Meester Groot speak for himself?”

Snee rose smoothly, dapper in his outfit of sober responsibility. “Meester Groot, beset by privation, has requested my assistance. I am Sunworth Snee, of the firm of Snee, Ruffson, League, and Gatling. Meester Speaker, we question the absence of Councillor Dooglas from these proceedings, since we will demonstrate how he was truly the principal in this vicious and unprovoked attack against Meester Groot.”

“The Chair, too, questions the absence and activities of Councillor Dooglas, Meester Snee,” said the Speaker, in a tone shading a surprising distance toward the dire. “Nevertheless, we will ask that all available facts and players be set before this assembly, and perhaps Councillor Dooglas will grace us with his presence before we have concluded.”

Snee inclined his head toward the Speaker, flashed Groot a reassuring nod, and sat, as the Speaker called on Mark Lizzard to say his piece. It was the same thing as Groot had already heard from him during their earlier meeting. Groot looked out across the room, still looking for Dooglas, trying to gauge the tenor of the crowd. The chamber had a different feel from this close to the center, both of the room and of the debate. He gave up watching faces and followed the concentric swirl of the parquet outward beneath the benches toward the door. The metal floor of the chamber was almost completely covered by the parquet, which had been commissioned by the Council of seven years before, and the new rugs atop that concealed much of the new wood as well. By the entrance, though, the parquet sloped down to match the level of the door sill and ended there; the small gap between the shiny old metal and the doorframe itself was apparent enough if anyone was interested to look for it. Nowhere in the place, though, was there any sign of Dooglas, neither on the floor itself, nor in the doorway, nor in what was visible of the antechamber.

Lizzard finished, and then Snee rose to begin dismantling him. Although Groot had engaged Snee initially for his reputation in the guidance and litigation of the matters of business, he was pleasantly surprised to find him rising to the demands of the present occasion, displaying the full armamentarium of the prototypical barrister: the sly innuendo, the dramatic punctuation, the delicate control of “spin,” casting the available facts to provide the best reflection on Groot while gracefully weaving through them the odd supposition or outright conclusion he wished for the audience to appreciate. He had reached the story of Groot’s visit from the would-be torturers and their reluctant revelation of the warrant signed by Dooglas when a commotion began in the anteroom. A door slammed, heavy footsteps were heard, a gabble of voices rose. Snee broke off as the members craned their necks to try to glimpse what was going on. “Order in the cloakroom!” the Speaker was shouting as he bashed away with the Mallet.

“Order?” a voice floated back, cutting through the hubbub with its maniac edge. “Oh, yes, I’ll give you order.” A quick high-pitched laugh that was almost a giggle followed the words, and then following the laugh into the chamber came a man; Dooglas. Behind him, though, the disturbance in the entry hall continued.

“Councillor,” said the Speaker, his neatly pointed gray beard waggling with accusation, “I charge you to restore the composure you have so wantonly violated.”

“You are wanton in your own demands, you old moppet,” shouted Dooglas. “First you want order, then composure – well, which is it? Perhaps I’ll give you order first, and then the composure will take care of itself, heh?” He spun around, his ermine cloak flapping and swishing and his jewels clanking and clattering; he really was horribly overdressed, Groot realized, and he was actually wearing a powdered wig. “You heard the Speaker,” he yelled through the door. “Quiet out there. Order!”

Surprisingly, the commotion did die down, with a last couple of thumps and a metallic twang; a rather ominous silence replaced it. “There,” said Dooglas, striding down the aisle to the front row. He struck a dramatic stance, his feet planted strongly, one hand on his hip and the other raised with a flourish, and swept his eyes around the room. “Order is restored. Shall we proceed with the show?” He dropped into the seat the current occupants of the bench had prudently opened up for him, then concluded his entrance with another surprising titter.

“The second childhood, is it, then?” said a voice across the Pit from Dooglas; old Caloot, who, from the scraggly white-maned creased-skin looks he’d affected throughout living memory, most likely had more than a passing personal familiarity with the subject himself. He got his own small scattering of laughter but no more than that. Dooglas, for all his new-found eccentric flamboyance, had the members spooked.

The Speaker employed his Mallet again. “Will someone step into the cloakroom and bring out the Doorkeeper? Councillor Toomey, I see you by the aisle, will you be so good ... thank you.” Just as Toomey reached the top of the aisle, the door to the anteroom slammed shut in his face. A voice spoke indistinctly behind it.

Toomey listened closely, then turned to address the Council, displaying his own look of puzzlement. “He says it’s rather a mess, but he’ll have it cleaned up in a moment. Not to worry, he says, there’s the guard of honor out there with him.”

“Captain,” the Speaker said in a low voice to the head of Groot’s personal escort, “would you mind having your men assess the situation in the cloakroom?”