Glen Cook - Old Tin Sorrows

Dojango staggered up the steps with four big cases. They probably outweighed him. His face was frozen in a rictus of a grin.

Cook seemed satisfied that everything was under control. She headed into the house. Never said a word to me. My feelings were hurt.

But not much.

Dojango arrived panting like he'd run twenty miles. Doctor Doom said, "Shall we begin?"

Once the good doctor stopped clowning, he impressed me as quite professional.

He started at the fountain, about which he made several remarks, suggesting he thought it one of the great sculptures of the modern age. He asked if it might be for sale in the foreseeable future.

Peters and I exchanged glances. Peters was way out at sea, encountering a side of the world about which he'd only heard before. He said, "Unlikely, doctor. Unlikely."

"A pity. A great pity. I'd love to own it. It would make a wonderful prop." He shuffled through his cases as Dojango popped them open, took out this and that—and nobody else knew what they were. For all I could tell they had no use at all and were just stuff to impress the peasants.

Three minutes later he said, "A great many traumatic events have occurred in this house." He looked at something in his hand, drifted to the spot where Chain had made his exit from this vale of tears. The boys had cleaned up good. I guessed Chain was taking his ease in the wellhouse till planting time.

"A man died here recently. Violently." Doom looked up. "Pushed, I'd guess."

"On the money," I admitted. "Maybe an hour after midnight last night."

He wandered around. "The dead have walked here. Zombies... No! Worse. Not under control. Draugs."

I looked at Morley. "I guess he knows his stuff. Unless he's got a friend on the inside."

"You're suspicious of everything."

"Occupational hazard."

The spook hunter spent fifteen minutes just standing by the fountain with his eyes closed, holding some doohickeys to his ears. I'd begun to wonder if we weren't getting shucked after all when he came back from wherever he'd been. "This is a house of blood. The very stones vibrate with memories of great evils done." He shuddered, closed his eyes for another three minutes, then turned to me. "You're the man who needs my help?"

"I'm the guy the General hired to straighten out a mess that only gets more tangled by the minute."

He nodded. "Tell me what you've learned. There have been so many evils done here that it's impossible to separate them."

"That'll take awhile. Why don't we get comfortable?" I led him to one of the rooms on the first floor west where, I presumed, in better times the business of the estate had been managed. We settled. Peters went off to sweet-talk Cook into providing the next best thing to refreshments in a household where alcohol was banned.

"A twisted place indeed," Doom said when he learned that. I decided maybe he wasn't so bad after all.

I told him what I'd learned, which wasn't that much when you came down to it. Mostly a catalog of crimes.

He asked no questions till I finished. "The spirit seems content to victimize your principal? The other deaths are the work of other hands?"

"Hell, I don't know. The longer I'm here, the more confused I get. Every time somebody dies or emigrates, the list of suspects gets more improbable." I explained how I'd had Chain locked in as the villain—till he took his tumble.

He considered. He reflected. He took his time. He was one guy who didn't get in a hurry. He said, "Yours isn't my field of expertise, Mr. Garrett, but I would, as a disinterested layman, suggest that you may be following false trails because you began with faulty assumptions."

"Say what?"

"You think you're after someone who wants a greater share of the estate. Have you considered another motive? The heirs keep demonstrating a lack of interest in the legacy. Perhaps there's another cause for murder entirely."

"Perhaps." I'm not exactly a dummy. I'd considered that. But I couldn't come up with anything to connect these people any other way. Only the legacy offered any normal basis for bloodshed. I told him that. "I'm open to suggestions. I'll tell you I am."

He did some reflecting. "How separate are your separate investigations?"

I explained it the way I saw it. Morley fretted, thinking my perspective too narrow.

"Good heavens!"

"Huh?"

Doom was staring past my shoulder. I had my back to the doorway. I turned.

Jennifer had appeared.

"Good heavens," I said.

She looked like death warmed over.

Doom said, "Come here, child. Instantly."

I got up, put an arm around her waist. She was almost too weak to walk. She hadn't had strength enough to dress herself properly. "Garrett... " There were tears in her eyes.

That's all she said. I led her to the seat I'd vacated. The light was better. What it showed me wasn't. She'd taken on the color the old man showed. "It's after her," I croaked. "The spook."

Doom looked at her a long time before he said, "Yes."

Morley looked at her, too. Then he looked at me. "Garrett, let's take a walk. Doc, see what you can do for her. We'll be back."

Numb, I didn't say anything till Morley started leading me upstairs. "What are we doing?"

"That spook's been gnawing on the old man for a year, right? It never bothered anybody else. Right?"

"Yeah." We were headed for my suite.

"Something changed that between last night and this morning."

We reached the fourth floor, me puffing and renewing my vow to get in shape. "I guess. But what?"

He unlocked the door with my key, held it for me. Once we were inside, he took down the portrait of my mystery blonde. "Where'd you spend the night, Garrett?"

I looked at her. I looked at him. I recalled seeing her as I wandered home. I said, "Oh." That's all I had to say. It was a lot to swallow.

Morley went back into the hall, me tagging along. He said, "Time to get an opinion on this from everyone."

"Morley, this isn't possible."

"Maybe not. I hope not." He has no mercy sometimes. His tone was a hot flensing knife.

We returned to the room where Doom and Jennifer were. Doom was disturbed. Jennifer looked a lot better, though. He'd done something for her. She had strength and attention enough now to put herself into better array. Morley placed the portrait on a table nearby, face down. "Peters. Would you get everyone in here? Garrett has something to show everybody."

Peters had been hovering over Jennifer. He looked at me. I said, "Please?"

"The General, too?"

"We can do without him for the moment."

He was gone longer than I expected. I found out why when he came back. "Cook and Kaid were up feeding the General. Garrett, he's damned near gone. Can't even sit up. Can't talk. It's like he's had a stroke. Or had all but the last ounce of life sucked out."

Doom listened but said nothing.

"How soon will they be here?"

"Soon as they get him cleaned up. He fouled his bed. He's never done that before. He always got hold of Kaid or Dellwood. Most times he had enough strength to make it to his chamberpot."

After that there wasn't much to say. I watched Doom fuss over Jennifer and Jennifer continue to improve. I tried not to dwell on what Morley had said without saying it in so many words. There are things you just don't want to believe.

Kaid and Cook came in, Cook grumbling steadily about the interruptions in her schedule. Morley said, "Sit down, please. Garrett?"

I knew what I had to do. I didn't want to, for some reason that seemed almost outside me. But Garrett's got willpower. I looked at Jennifer. Too bad Garrett don't have a little more won't power.

"Snake Bradon was a remarkable artist but it seems he never showed his work. Which is a damned sin. He was able to capture the essence of what it felt like in the Cantard. He painted people, too. With a very skewed eye. This is one of his portraits. I managed to save it from the stable fire. It could be the key to everything. I want you all to look at it and tell me about it."