Glen Cook - Sweet Silver Blues

A ham of a hand slapped me on the back. "Garrett, you look like a man who's just had a religious revelation."

"I have. And the first saint of my new church is going to be Saint Playmate."

"As long as the job don't call for a martyr."

"Have faith, my friend. And make lots of donations. That's all this church will ask."

"Most of them only ask for the offerings. I tell you I almost started my own church once?"

"No."

"I was scoping it out when I thought I was going to lose the stable. I figure a man my size, tricked up in the right outfit, would make a hell of a prophet. And in a city as god-ridden as TunFaire, people are always looking for something novel."

"Wouldn't have thought you so cynical."

"Me? Cynical? Perish the thought. Come back when you need a horse, Garrett."

Morley and the triplets were sitting around looking smug when I showed up at the Tate place with my travel bag on my shoulder. "You guys earned your keep? Or are you just in practice for the next time the Grinning Death comes through?"

Morley stopped gnawing a carrot long enough to say, "We thumped some heads this morning, Garrett."

Doris bobbed his head and chortled something in dialect. Morley said, "He just claimed he broke twenty heads himself. He's exaggerating. There weren't more than fifteen guys involved. I recognized some of them. Second-raters. Whoever hired them was trying to get by on the cheap. He got what he paid for."

I wondered if any of them had recognized Morley. "Did they get away with anything?"

"A lot of bruises and a few fractures."

"I mean anything physical."

"That isn't physical enough for you?"

"Damn it, you know what I mean."

"Testy in the morning, aren't we? You didn't pay a bit of attention when I explained about fiber."

"Morley!"

"No. Nothing."

"Thank you."

"What's in the bag?"

"My travel gear. We're headed out."

"Today?"

"You have some reason to hang around?"

"Not really. You just caught me by surprise."

That was the idea. "The arrangements are made. You guys are ready to go. We'll head for the boat from here and hide out there till we pull out."

"Boat? What are you talking, boat?"

Morley was ghost-spooked pale. The triplets looked green around the gills, which was something for Doris and Marsha, who were a lovely shade of pale lime to begin.

"Boat?" Morley croaked again.

"Boat. We'll barge down to Leifmold, then catch a coaster headed south. We'll stay with it as far as we can. Then we'll put ashore and finish what we have to overland."

"We mix with water worse than oil does, Garrett."

"Nonsense. All the great navigators were elvish."

"All the great navigators were crazy. I get seasick watching the water-spider races. Which may explain why I can't bet them worth squat."

"Probably not enough starch in your diet."

He looked at me with hurt puppy eyes. "Let's take it overland, Garrett."

"Not on your life. I don't get along with horses."

"So we walk. The triplets can carry—"

"Who's paying the wages, Morley?"

He did nothing but scowl.

"Right. The boss says we take boats as far as we can, then we do it the hard way. You have your boys pick up and pack up. We head out in fifteen minutes."

I went and hunted up Pop Tate and told him I'd be doing the job and would be leaving the city shortly. We dickered awhile about expense money. To end up with what I wanted I had to give him what he wanted, a pretty complete outline of my plans.

I could change them, of course.

I don't like letting people in on everything. It subverts my reputation for being unpredictable.

The river barge Binkey's Sequin reminded me of a shopkeeper's wife. She was middle-aged, middle class, a little run down, a little overweight, extremely stubborn and set in her ways, needing masterful coaxing and cajoling to get her to give her loving best, but also faithful and warm and unsinkably optimistic in her care for her children. Morley hated her at first sight. He prefers them sleek, lean, taut, and fast.

Master Arbanos, her skipper, was an oversize gnome of that ethnic minority the ignorant sometimes confuse with hobgoblins (though any idiot knows hobgoblins don't come out in the daytime because the sunlight would broil their eyeballs). After he got us settled in what, with a smile of self-mockery, he called the cabin, he pulled me aside and told me, "We won't be able to sail till morning. Hope that don't throw you off schedule."

"No." But being naturally nosy and suspicious, I wanted to know why.

"Cargo's late. Best part, that is. Twenty-five cask of the TunFaire Gold, that they don't trust nobody but me and my brother to get down the river unbruised."

TunFaire Gold is a premium wine with a reputation for traveling poorly.

"So here I sit," he complained, "with eight ton of potato, two ton of onion, three ton of pig-iron billet, and forty hogshead of navy salt pork turning to mold while I wait for them to baby that spoiled grape juice down from TagEnd. If I didn't get paid more for hauling that than the rest put together, I'd tell them what to do with their TunFaire Gold poison! You bet I would."

Cargo manifests. How thoroughly exciting. "No problem for us. As long as we get there in a reasonable amount of time."

"Oh, won't be no problem with that. We'll get there almost the same time we would have."

"We will? Why?"

"We'll be going out with the tide, with an extra five knot of current running where the river is usually slowest. I just thought you might be in a hurry to move at this end, what with the way your friends are keeping out of sight down with the codfish smell. The way I hear tell, you landsider don't favor fish odor too much."

I had not mentioned the stench, being the naturally courteous guy that I am. But, "Now that you bring it up... "

"What?"

"Wait."

One of the Tate cousins or nephews was limping down the dock, checking ships with mad eyes. He was covered with dried blood. People stepped out of his way and stared after him.

He spotted me, staggered faster. I went to meet him.

"Mr. Garrett! They got Tinnie and Rose! They said if we don't give them Denny's papers—"

He collapsed. I caught him, lifted him up, and carried him aboard Binkey's Sequin. Master Arbanos gave me an appalled look. Before he started complaining, I tossed him a couple of marks. His personality shifted like a wolfman's under a full moon. You would have thought he was the boy's mother.

A draft of brandy bubbling in the gut got the kid into a state to tell his tale.

Rose and Tinnie, as was their custom, had gone out to do the afternoon marketing. Lester and the usual cousins and nephews and some kitchen help had accompanied them, again as was customary. When they were returning with the servants and two boys lugging vegetables and whatnot, disaster had struck, in the form of Vasco and a half-dozen thugs.

"They grabbed Rose and Tinnie before we could drop the groceries and get our weapons out. Uncle Lester was the only one who was able... They killed him, Mr. Garrett."

"You all do them any damage?" The kid wouldn't have been in such bad shape if they hadn't tried. I needed to know how much blood was in it to tell if the women had a chance.

"Some," he admitted. "I don't think we killed anybody. We had to back off first. That's when they said we could have them back if we gave them Denny's letters and notebooks and stuff."

Well, they had no real reason to commit murder. The blood was balanced. One of their lot for Uncle Lester. A trade could be made. The problem was, they would find out I was headed south if I had much to do with the exchange.