Whispering Nickel Idols

18

The second morning was nothing like the first. I wakened in a foul temper, head pounding. Dean and I needed to share a word. Cutting costs is all very well, but not by buying cheap brew. Just so he could pocket a few extra coppers that, no doubt, he’d waste on food for cripples and orphans.

I was first downstairs. Except for Dean, of course. But Dean was out shopping. Or something. Because he’d left food on the table, around the suffering remnants of Melondie Kadare.

The John Stretch leftovers would be around the house somewhere, too.

The rain-on-your-parade boys from the city were on the job. They pounded the oak occasionally. It stubbornly refused to open. Eventually, they gave up.

The rules are odd. And Relway sticks to them like a limpet-if he suspects that you might be one of the good guys.

Those associated with the dark side increasingly show an alarming tendency to disappear. Alarming to the bad boys, that is.

People applaud that, saying nobody with a clear conscience needs to worry. Till Relway’s troops show up because they’ve done something that, in their reasoned opinion, wasn’t really a crime. Never mind what the law says. Let’s review:

— Absolute power corrupts absolutely.

— The road to Hell is paved with good intentions.

— No good deed goes unpunished.

All applicable where Deal Relway is concerned.

Brother Relway has only the best interest of the people at heart.

I have trouble faulting the man. Sometimes. “He needed killing” is a valid argument before the bench. Director Relway seems able to meet the burden of proof when challenged.

I ate. Biscuits with honey. Biscuits with damson preserves. Leftover sausage from the previous night that the cats hadn’t gotten.

The sweet buns with sausage inside aren’t good cold.

Finished eating, I scooped up Melondie and headed up front to hand her over to her own people.

Through abiding and ancient habit, I used the peephole.

There were people out there. Big, ugly, hairy people. Only one wore green pants. The rest were incognito. Every man jack came equipped with bandages. One had an arm in a sling. Another had a leg in splints. He and a third were getting around on multiple crutches. None of them seemed to have concluded that bothering me was not a good idea.

Penny Dreadful’s friends. What had become of her? She’d faded like a wisp of steam once Melondie identified her.

The Ugly Pants Gang had to be in an even bleaker mood than I was. Considering the state they’d been in when last seen, I assumed they would be grumpy.

Trust sweet old Garrett to get stricken paranoid. Why would this crew be on my doorstep?

I shrugged. Not a worry. I had a ton of food laid in. I had a backup keg of beer. Dean had a platoon of homely nieces he could stay with during a siege. If he was smart enough to spot the watchers and stay away.

Meantime, I could do some speculating. Why was I involved in this? And I could figure out some way to waken the Dead Man.

I went back to the kitchen, made tea, took a mug into my office. Eleanor wore a sneer of disdain. “So you’re in a mood this morning, too.” Which only squeezed more juice out of the lemon.

Somebody pounded on my door. I didn’t go see who. I was comfortable with my brooding and Eleanor’s dreary mood.

I shunted from puzzle to puzzle, free-associating. The medicine I’d added to the tea quieted the worst pounding inside my head. What really happened at Whitefield Hall?

“Meow.”

A cat climbed my leg. A second bounced into the client’s chair. Two or three more chased each other around the room, then back into the hall. I scratched and petted the one in my lap, then hoisted him and gave him the full eyeball bath.

He was just a baby cat. Though chunkier than most. Maybe his daddy was a bobcat.

“What’s so special about you, little guy? How come the world’s ugliest fashion retards are out to get you?” But were they? That deserved reflection, too.

He didn’t answer. Flat refused to solve any puzzles for me. The people-and critters-you have to deal with in this racket. Ugh.

“Eleanor. What do you think? Is it all about the cats? Or the bucket they came in?”

Eleanor didn’t say. I felt her worrying about me being slow to grasp the obvious.

The drill instructors and senior sergeants figured me out quick in the Corps. They’d already seen every get-around and get-out-of-it scam ever invented a long time before I turned up making like I was dumber than a bushel of rocks. But I can work that on most people here in TunFaire. People in this burg see what they want to see. I strive to remain underestimated. Or so I tell myself.

“This feels good,” I told Eleanor. “I could just lean back with a lapful of cats and nap the afternoon away.” Then I’d go out tonight because I couldn’t sleep. Somebody would tell Tinnie Tate, who thinks she has a claim on me. And does. And vice versa. But I’ve got the worst case of Retarded Commitment Capacity Syndrome west of Morley Dotes. Morley being of international-competitor status.

Eleanor’s disapproval pattered down like an iron rain. I needed to do three things. See Harvester Temisk. Visit the Bledsoe. And catch Penny Dreadful. While dodging Relway thugs and large men in hideous pants.

It sounded like the sappers had brought up a battering ram. The door remained stubborn.

I might be betting to an inside straight, but I couldn’t see Relway not responding if the Ugly Pants Gang stuck around long.

His top men would be out there keeping an eye on my place.

“I’m going to try to get Old Bones to bestir himself. Again.”

Eleanor’s attitude was suitably discouraging.

“If I have to, I’ll fill his room up with cranky old women.”

The Dead Man doesn’t have much use for the obstinate sex. And he’s never been pleased that my attitude is the opposite.

He’s been dead for four hundred years. He’s forgotten all the good stuff.

Old Bones did exactly what I expected. A whole lot of nothing.

The assault on my front door faded briefly, resumed as a new villain laid on.

My pixies ran out of tolerance. A flurry of anger heralded a whir of little wings. It sounded like a full cluster launch.

I sighed, lit a new bug candle, proceeded to commence to begin out there on my front stoop.

Muttering like one of those scramble brains who bustle through the streets on grave, unimaginable missions, debating it all with themselves, I went to the peephole. Outside, chaos celebrated the spontaneous self-creation of the deities of disorder of the thousand pantheons that afflict TunFaire.

Pixies, pixies everywhere, pestering biggies without prejudice.

Relway’s Runners and their fellow travelers had arrived but were waiting to see what developed.

I offered no evidence that my place was anything but deserted. The Watch knew better, but wouldn’t press the issue.

Only the Green Pants Gang were dim enough to keep on keeping on. They had to be clueless about the Dead Man.

I snickered at the prancing big guys as the pixies pestered them. Like a dance number in a musical play about an army field hospital.

I spotted Dean. The old boy did have sense enough to stand back.

I spied Penny Dreadful, too, across the street, to the left of and behind Dean. She couldn’t be seen by the big guys unless the one at my door turned and looked for her. She did well at being just another gawker.

The pixies pricked the big guys enough with their poisoned blades. They began slowing down. They just couldn’t get a handle on the fact that people might keep them from doing whatever they wanted. Ymber must be a strange town.

Whistles shrieked.

The Watch moved in.

They couldn’t wait anymore. My neighbors were getting restless. The Watch couldn’t let the situation deteriorate till witnesses began damaging city property. The property in question being the street itself.

When a TunFairen crowd gets rowdy it rips up cobblestones for ammunition. A grand brawl can strip an entire neighborhood of its pavements.

Relway’s boys didn’t have much trouble with the groggy bad guys.

The villains seemed less numerous when they were laid out like logs ready to be floated off to the mill. There were just four of them.

Some must have gotten away.