Cruel Zinc Melodies

19

‘‘Mr. Garrett?’’

A kid had come up behind me. ‘‘Kip Prose! How are you?’’ I hadn’t seen him for a while. He’d grown, though he was still barely a mouse breath more than five feet. His blond hair was longer and wilder, his eyes bluer and crazier. His waist was more substantial. His freckles were more numerous. He did a better job of holding still, but broke into sudden, brief fits of scratching and twitching. Wealth hadn’t changed him inside.

Cypres Prose is the strangest kid I ever met. He has three redeeming qualities. Two any man can see at a glance. A gorgeous mother, Kayne Prose. And an older sister, Cassie Doap, who makes Mom look dowdy. The third quality is less obvious: the boy is a screaming genius. Of no special ambition, but with ideas that could make a lot of people rich. Maybe including me.

I have that small interest in the manufactory producing three-wheels, writing sticks, and other innovations sprung from Kip Prose’s twisted brain. I have the points because I found the genius, kept him alive, and put him together with people who have the money and space to create a manufacturing concern. The Weiders and the Tates.

‘‘I’m doing quite well, Mr. Garrett. And yourself?’’

I was suspicious immediately. Be abidingly suspicious of any teenage male who is mannerly, respectful, and absent attitude.

That kid is up to something. Guaranteed.

Kip wasn’t alone. Two friends, of a similarly weird appearance, had stayed across the street. They pretended no interest in what was going on.

Definitely suspicious.

Tinnie is a clever judge of people. When she bothers. Usually she deploys her skills against me alone. She made an exception here. ‘‘And how is your mother? And your sister, Cassie?’’ She turned on the flaming redheaded heat, guaranteed to send Kip into cardiac arrest, turn him to gelatin, and make him speak in tongues with vocabularies of one syllable.

Kip chirped like a frog. Once.

Tinnie got very close to him.

Kip knew who she was. One of those black widow fantasy women from the Tate tribe. He’d seen her around the manufactory. No doubt she’d imprinted herself on his libidinous consciousness.

It’s bad enough when that wicked wench turns it on to an old jade like me. It’s fish in a barrel, targeting a repressed boy Cypres Prose’s age.

‘‘Oh, that’s good,’’ I said. ‘‘You fried his brain. How do I get anything out of him now?’’ Kip’s friends, I noted, were not pleased, either.

‘‘What do you want to know? Maybe I’ll ask.’’

‘‘All right. But afterward I’m going to drive a stake through your heart.’’

‘‘That’s a straight line I could play with for . . . a minute or two.’’

‘‘Promises, promises.’’

Kip resumed breathing.

Tinnie told me, ‘‘You don’t want to know about his mother or sister. When I snap my fingers you will forget he has a mother or sister.’’Snap!

‘‘Yes, master. I have no interest in the welfare of absent beautiful women. But now I know how you cast your spell on me.’’

That earned me a nasty look. I survived it and worse consequences because Kip’s eyes rolled back down. He began speaking actual words.

I asked, ‘‘What the hell are you doing down here, Kip?’’

I could guess. He was a teenage boy. With the financial means to indulge a teenage boy’s fantasies. The Tenderloin was a stone’s throw on down the street.

Not smart. You could get dead. A dozen different ways. Not all of them sudden.

Clever lad, he avoided answering by responding to what I’d asked earlier. ‘‘Mom is fine. Kind of doesn’t know what to do with herself now that she doesn’t have to work all the time.’’

He has a significant interest in the manufacturing concern. Between them, he, his mother, and sister control the biggest chunk. He’d insisted.

‘‘You get her that house?’’

‘‘The one where she always lived. It’s all hers, free and clear, now.’’

‘‘That’s good. What are you doing down here? Not wasting yourself in the Tenderloin, I hope.’’

Kip turned bright red. Brighter than when Tinnie worked her witchcraft. He sputtered. Then choked out, ‘‘I’m just hanging out with my friends.’’ He indicated the impatient boys across the street. He and those two looked like one socially challenged pod. The friends were tense and irritated and eager to distance themselves from the World. ‘‘I just saw you and decided to say hi. What’re you doing?’’

‘‘Killing bugs.’’ I pointed at the beetle by the wheel of Playmate’s coach.

Kip’s eyes got big. ‘‘Wow! Well, I got to go.’’

‘‘Good seeing you again,’’ Tinnie told him.

He gurgled, waggled a hand feebly, and headed out. Tinnie blew him a kiss, just to amuse his sidekicks. Who started in on him as soon as they could without having me hear what they said.

‘‘Having fun with the cruel and unusual, woman?’’

‘‘You ever make that mistake when you were a kid?’’

‘‘I didn’t know any beautiful redheads then.’’

‘‘Cute. Try again.’’

‘‘What mistake?’’

‘‘Trying to distract an adult’s curiosity with a preemptive move.’’

‘‘I don’t follow.’’

‘‘And you a skilled detective. He was going by. He didn’t want you wondering why he was down here. So he decided to establish his innocence ahead of time. Neither of us would’ve noticed him if he hadn’t pointed himself out. But now you have noticed. And now you’re curious.’’

‘‘Got you. Yeah. I made that mistake a few times.’’

‘‘Never worked, did it?’’

‘‘Nope. Turned around and bit me every time. I’m going to find Singe.’’

Kip and his friends left quickly, all talking at the same time, all of them angry.

The ratpeople inside the World weren’t pleased to see me. They figured I was there to micromanage. Like Max, though, I’d rather tell somebody what needs doing, then get the hell out of the way. Most of the time. ‘‘Singe. I need you outside.’’

As we headed for the coach, she asked, ‘‘That’s the same boy who was involved with the silver elves?’’

‘‘The same.’’ She’d tracked Kip before.

‘‘What do I need to do?’’

‘‘Find out where he goes. And what he’s up to, if you can do that without getting caught.’’

‘‘You aren’t coming?’’

‘‘You aren’t ready to operate on your own?’’

‘‘I am ready.’’ Proudly.

‘‘Excellent.’’

She picked up the trail right away.

Tinnie asked, ‘‘Is that smart? Sending her off by herself?’’

‘‘The kid has to grow up someday. She manages ordinary household business on her own.’’

‘‘I suppose.’’

‘‘What happened to Saucerhead and Playmate?’’

‘‘They went down that alley over there. To check with a man about a mule.’’

Together? That was a girlie thing to do.

‘‘You heard from Alyx? Or the others?’’

‘‘Not lately. Why?’’ Eyes all narrow.

‘‘You and Max should form a club. He’s also sure Alyx is in dire peril from the dread Garrett beast.’’

‘‘The beast isn’t that bad. But it better not get caught fondling any blondes. Of any kind.’’

Kip’s mother and sister were blondes, last time I saw them. ‘‘Pretty draconian, wouldn’t you say? What?’’

Her face had drained. Even the freckles had gone.

She was staring over my shoulder.

Before I ever turned, I told her, ‘‘Get in the coach. Lock any locks you find. And don’t come out till Play and Saucerhead get back. No matter what.’’