Gilded Latten Bones

69

I was still distracted when we reached the kitchen. Kind old Dean served breakfast despite the time. He was in a fine mood.

Morley shuffled in. He checked us out, smirked, but never said a word. Penny appeared as Dean set a plate in front of Morley. She sniffed as she settled into the last chair. She gave Strafa a dark look but didn't say anything, either.

Playmate stuck his head in. "Anything I can do, Dean?" While he eyeballed me and Strafa.

"You could grab a hammer, some nails, and some boards, and add on to my kitchen. Otherwise, no. We can't squeeze another body in."

It wasn't that crowded-though nobody would be able to move if Playmate put himself on our side of the door.

I asked, "Dean, who all is here? Besides who all I can see right now."

"Singe. Some of John Stretch's people. That creature who calls himself the Bird."

Penny said, "Bird came to paint. His Honor is napping, though. So Bird is silencing his voices instead."

That was about the longest speech she'd ever made in my presence. She sounded disconsolate. I risked panicking her. "What do you think about him, Penny? Does he really hear voices?"

She made herself reply, her voice tiny as she did so. "Yes. He hears them. And not just because he's crazy. They're real. He let me talk to them while we were working."

Kitchen business stopped. Penny shrank under the pressure of curious eyes.

"The Dead Man thinks the Bird belongs in the crazy ward at the Bledsoe."

"His Honor can't hear the voices. He only hears Bird's answers. If Bird does answer. Mostly, he just takes another drink."

"How did you talk to the voices, then?"

"Bird told me what they said. They heard me when I answered."

Dean rested a reassuring hand on Penny's shoulder. "You'll be all right."

I didn't get the girl. A couple, three years ago she had been hell on wheels, acting in her role as high priestess of a screw-ball country cult, hiding out from religious enemies. But she'd always been pathologically shy around me. Which, as Kyra had told her, was totally Tinnie's fault.

I asked, "You talked to them?"

"Sure."

I blew my nose. "How did that work?"

"Bird just lets the voice take over. Then I talk to the ghost. It doesn't last long. Bird only lets them talk so people will know he's telling the truth."

I made myself stay calm. I had to keep the intensity down. Penny would trample Playmate trying to get away if I tripped her panic response. "I'd sure like to see that." Penny did not volunteer to arrange it. "Who do the voices belong to?"

"Dead people. People who were murdered. Awful people, mostly."

I once spent time in a relationship with a woman who had been murdered when I was a child. I met her ghost as an adult. I had no trouble with Penny's notion. "Do tell."

"Tell what? That the ones I talked to sounded like they got what they had coming? That's what drives Bird crazy. He has these whiny haunts, who deserved what they got, insisting that he do things for them."

"I've got it." Not only did the Bird have to deal with ghosts, his spooks belonged to that select crew who think they are more special than anyone else and should get special treatment always, in the main because they survived childbirth.

In TunFaire these leeches tend to come to a bad end early, though their survivability has improved since the war's end.

Once upon a time the body politic shed its parasites in the cauldron of the Cantard. They could be counted on to get themselves killed.

The war had had its fierce egalitarian side. There had been no buying out of it-though the clever had been able to wrangle less risky assignments. Princes and paupers, everyone took his dip in the deadly pond. Old folks were nostalgic for the days when the war kept the streets clear of loud, badly behaved, sometimes dangerous young men.

"Mr. Garrett?"

"I'm sorry. Having an old man's moment. You're used to Old Bones. Can he fix the Bird's brain so he doesn't hear those people?"

"I don't think Bird would want that. He hates the voices. But if they aren't pestering him and he doesn't drink, he can't paint." Then she asked, "How long do you think His Honor will sleep?"

"I've never figured the formula out. You'd do better to ask Singe."

"What should I do since he's not awake?"

"What would you be doing if you weren't hunkered down here?"

"Stuff. I don't know. Dean and Singe both say I shouldn't leave. Those bad people might want to get hold of someone from this house."

"Dean is a wise man. Why don't you help him? These past few days have been hard for him. And you can help Singe, if she needs it. I'm going to go bug her myself, right now."

Everyone bailed when I did. Penny stayed with Dean. I saw no enthusiasm in either of them.

Singe was writing something using an Amalgamated steel tip quill. "The Dead Man's pet girl says she talks to the ghosts that haunt the drunken artist."

"Take him along next time you dance with the dead men. Turn them around on their mistress."

"I'll run it past Old Bones when he wakes up. I have some questions for you."

"Blow your nose first. That sniffling is disgusting."

I took care of that, and coughed up some stuff besides. "Did anyone trace the giant bottles and glass vats from that warehouse?"

"Not that I know of. The Director and the Guard aren't keeping me in the loop. I didn't think to ask last time the General was here. Speaking of whom, he's late. No one else tells me anything useful, either. Including your new wrestling partner."

"You're leaping to conclusions. What did Old Bones get out of those villains that Block loaned us?"

"He didn't say, officially. Unofficially, what I expected. Nothing that we didn't already know. They were day labor."

"Has anyone found out anything useful?"

"Not yet. You would think the resurrection men, at least, could be found. Are you bored? I'm not here to entertain you. I have work to do."

"Hokum." I suspected that she was crabby because her body was disgruntled because she had not mated successfully during her season.

"I had another question. The most important one. But I can't remember what it was. Wait! Here it is. Old Bones had me chase Relway the other day to tell him about men who were watching the house. Did Relway bother to let us know who they were?"

"Not officially."

"Unofficially?"

"General Block was informed that they belonged to the King's Household Lifeguard. The Palace Guard. He wasn't convinced. He thought they were really private police from the Hill."

Either possibility was disturbing. I didn't want to attract attention from either direction. "Not good."

"But maybe an indication that powerful people take the situation seriously."

I started to say something.

"If all you can do is chatter, take the woman back upstairs or go frighten Penny. I'm busy."

"Ah, you're no fun anymore."

"That's all your fault. Out."