Gilded Latten Bones

37

Belinda isolated me, in with Morley, amongst the deaf ratmen. "They insist that we back off. That we have to let this alone."

"They? We?"

"Don't play word games."

"I'm not. You know what I mean. Nobody has told me not to do anything. And the only we I'm part of is me and Morley."

"Then I'd have to ask why most everyone you know by name is here. I even saw that poisoner, Kolda, a minute ago."

"He's not a poisoner." Distracted. "I don't know why you're all here. I had nothing to do with that. Like I told the General."

She didn't believe me either. Someday I'll make a huge score because nobody will take me at face value. I could loot the Royal Mint, then run around yelling about how it was me that done it.

I did know what was going on. Singe and the Dead Man had cooked a plan to investigate out of my house. They would use people we had worked with in the past. I found it disconcerting that they weren't troubled by a Hill interest potent enough to make Prince Rupert back off. Old Bones must have seen a way to get away with defying that which must not be defied.

This was shaping up to be what I'd had in mind when I'd visited with the Windwalker. Who was not around today.

I asked, "Is that healer ever going to come?"

"Are you kidding? After what I paid him before?"

"And he isn't worried about my friend in the other room?"

"He doesn't know. I told him you spilled the medicine. That we'll want more. But first he has to take another look at Morley. I'm pretty sure there's something more wrong than what he thought before."

"And if he's a villain?"

"We'll know that straight off, won't we?"

We contemplated our mutual friend. Morley looked as peaceful as a man in a coffin.

I kept wondering why it was taking the healer so long to show.

He is out there. All the traffic makes him nervous. He does not like that but cannot shake his greed. He will come into the trap eventually.

My impatience faded. I just worried about Morley. Till my mind wandered off to Factory Slide.

An unexpected voice asked, "Garrett, are you all right?"

I looked up. "Gilbey?" Manville Gilbey and his recently acquired wife, Heather, were framed in the doorway. Gilbey was the number-two man in the Weider brewing empire. He seemed concerned. "I'm all right."

"We haven't seen you at the brewery lately. When I heard about your open house I thought we'd stop by and see what your situation is."

"It's marginal despair." I glanced at Morley. "What do you need to know?"

"Nothing, now. We've been circulating long enough to get a flavor. Max will stand behind you."

Of course, because Max Weider didn't like folks involved in illegal experimental sorcery. Several of his family were murdered by shape-shifting things created in abandoned beer vats. Max wouldn't mind exterminating the whole tribe of sorcerers.

Heather Gilbey was usually more forthcoming and social, naturally, than Manville, but today she just smiled and kept her mouth shut.

Gilbey told me, "Take care doing what you need to do, Garrett. We value you." He eyed Morley, then the ratmen with illegal weaponry. He knew Morley. Morley's restaurant was across from Max Weider's World Theater, where Heather was manager.

Heather gave me a slight smile before she stepped out of sight. I liked her fine but she was high on Tinnie's list. Tinnie had acted in several Jon Salvation plays. She had gotten a big head. A huge head. Heather wasted no time letting her know that her talents might be better appreciated elsewhere, a fierce stroke since the World is the only theater where female actresses are not expected to have other commerce with audience members.

Tinnie is not accustomed to failure and has almost no capacity for accepting criticism.