Gene Wolfe - Lake of the Long Sun

Silk nodded, wondering whether she realized how much he wanted to touch her. "I believe you, my daughter. If you wish me to know the truth, however, you must tell me. How did it appear to you at the time?"

"Crane was a friend, just like I said yesterday. He was nice, and he brought me things, when he didn't have to. You remember about the bouquet of chenille? Little stuff like that, but nice. Most of the girls like him, and sometimes I gave him a free one. He's got a thing for big girls. He sort of laughs about it."

Silk said, "He's sensitive about his height; he told me so the first time we met. It may be that a tall woman makes him feel taller. Go on."

"So that's how it's been with us ever since I moved into Orchid's place. He didn't say, I want you to do some spying, so promise to sell out your city and I'll give you a uniform. We were talking a couple months ago, four or five of us in the big room when Crane was there. There were jokes about what he does when he looks us over. About the checkups. You know the kind of thing?" "I don't," Silk admitted wearily, "though I can readily imagine."

"Somebody let it drop that a commissioner had been in, and Crane kind of whistled and asked who hooked him. I said it was me, and he wanted to know if he gave me much of a tip. Then later, when he was looking me over, he wanted to know if this commissioner happened to mention the calde."

Silk's eyebrows shot up. "The calde?"

"That's the way I felt, Patera. I said no, he didn't, and I thought the calde was dead. Crane said, yeah, sure, he is. But when we were done and I was getting dressed, he said that if this commissioner or anybody else ever said anything about the calde or the Charter, he'd like for me to tell him about it, or if he said anything about a councillor. Well, he had said something about councillors-"

"What was it?" Silk asked.

"Just that he'd gone out to the lake to see a couple of them, Tarsier and Loris. I went oh! and ah! the way you're supposed to, but I didn't think it sounded like it was very important. Crane just sort of stopped when I told it. You know what I mean?"

"Certainly."

"Then when I was dressed and going out, he was coming out of Violet's room and he passed me this folded up paper. He stuck it-you know, Patera-right down here. When I was alone I pulled it out and looked, and it was a bearer draft for five cards, signed by some cull I never even heard of. I thought probably itwas no good, but I was going up that way anyhow, so I took it to the fisc and they gave me five cards for it, no who are you or how'd you get hold of this at all. Just like that, five cards slap on the counter." Chenille paused, waiting for his reaction. "How often do you think I snaffle a dimber five-card tip like that, Patera?"

He shrugged. "Since you've entertained a commissioner, once a month, perhaps."

"Not counting that one, I've got two in my whole life and that's lily. At Orchid's the cully's forked ten bits to get in and look at the dells, and then he's got to pay me a card-I've got to split with Orchid-unless it's somebody like that commissioner. He gets in free and gets it free, because nobody wants trouble. The best of everything and keep telling him how good he is, and usually he don't tip, either. From the ones that pay, I get a card like I said. That's for all night if they want it. So if the first one does and he won't tip, I clear half a card for the whole night."

Silk said, "I know people who don't get half a card for a week's hard work."

"Sure you do. Why do you think we do it? But what I'm saying is that in a good week, with tips, I might clear four or five. Maybe six. Only if it is, next week'll be two or three every time. So here I've got as much as I'd make in a good week, just for telling Crane something this commissioner said. Real candy! You're going to tell me I should've known, but I didn't think much about it back then, and that's lily." Chenille paused again, as if anticipating an accusation. Silk murmured, "So that was how it began. What about the rest, my daughter?"

"Since then I've passed along maybe six or eight other things and taken things to a couple people for him dayside. Then if a commissioner or maybe a colonel-somebody like that, you know?-comes in, I'm really nice to them and I don't work them for tips and presents or anything like the other dells would. It's got to where they ask for me when I'm not around."

The night chough stirred uneasily on top of the curio cabinet, his head cocked inquiringly and his long, crimson beak half open.

"So ever since I saw Orpine on ice, I've been thinking." Chenille drew her chair nearer Silk's and lowered her voice. "You've got to fork twenty-six thousand to Blood if you want to hang onto this place? That's what Musk said." Silk's head inclined less than a finger's width. "All right, then. Why don't you-why don't you and me get it from Crane, Patera?"

"Man here," Oreb warned them. "Out there." Chenille glanced up at him apprehensively. "There now," Oreb insisted. "No knock."

Silk rose as silently as he could, irresistibly reminded of his failure to surprise Musk and Chenille earlier. Leaving Blood's walking stick beside his chair, he crossed the room to the Sun Street door, snatched the heavy bar out of its fittings and (retaining the bar in his left hand for use as a weapon if necessary) jerked the door open.

The tall, black-robed man waiting in the street beyond the step did not appear in the least surprised. "Did my presence here-ah-disturb you, Patera?" he inquired in a reverberant, nasal voice. "I strove to be discreet and - um-unobtrusive. Do you follow me? Subdued, eh? Not so skillful about it, perhaps. I'd reached your door before I heard the-ah lady's voice."

Silk leaned the bar against the wall. "I know that it's somewhat irregular, Your Eminence -" "Oh, no, no, no! You have your reasons, I'm certain, Patera." The black-robed man bowed from the waist. "Good evening, my dear. Good evening, and may every god be with you this night." He favored Silk with a toothy smile that. gleamed even in the glimmering light from the sky-lands. "I took great care to stand well out of the-ah-zone of-um-listening, Patera. Audibility? Earreach. Beyond the-ah-carry of the lady's voice. I could hear voices, I confess, save when a cart passed, if you follow me. But not one word you said. Couldn't make out a single thing, hey?" He smiled again. "Sweet Scylla, bear witness!"

Silk left the manse to stand upon its doorstep. "I'm exceedingly soRRy that I was so abrupt, Your Eminence. We heard-I should say we were told-"

"Perfectly proper. Patera." One hand flipped up in a gesture of dismissal. "Quite, quite correct."

"-that there was someone outside, but not who-" Silk took a deep breath. "Your business must be urgent, or it wouldn't have brought you out so late, Your Eminence. Won't you come in?"

He held the door, then barred it again when the black-robed man had entered. "This is our sellaria, I'm afraid. The best room we have. I can offer you water and-and bananas, if you'd like some." He recalled that he had not yet explored Kit's sack. "Perhaps some other sort of fruit, as well."

The black-robed man waved Silk's fruit away. "You were advising this young lady, weren't you. Patera? Not shriving her, I hope. Not yet at least, though I didn't understand a word. I'd recognize the-ah-cadence of the Pardon of Pas, or so I fancy, having performed it so many, many times myself. The litany of Sacred Names, hey? Speak here for Great Pas, for Divine Echidna, for Scalding Scylla, and the rest. And I heard nothing like that. Nothing at all."

Chenille, who had followed Silk to the door and stood behind him in the doorway, inquired, "You're an augur, too, Patera?"

The black-robed man bowed again, then held up the voided cross he wore; its gold chain gleamed like the Aureate Path itself in the dingy little sellaria. "I am indeed, my dear. One quite, quite capable of discretion, or I should not be where I am today, eh? So you've nothing to fear, not that I overheard a single word you said."