Wicked Bronze Ambition

67

We still had places to visit, people to see, things to do, but I declared, “We’ll head back to Macunado Street now. Helenia, Captain Scithe, we’ll drop you off on the way.”

Those two had been keeping quiet, trying to go unnoticed, with ears the size of saucers. Helenia, though, was pleased. She now knew she wasn’t a fieldwork kind of girl.

Scithe made himself look as bland as wild yogurt.

I wouldn’t be rid of him as easily.

I told Playmate, “I’ll let Dean and Singe know you’re coming.” I might have Dean boil up a kettle of grits if I had to feed a crowd.

Playmate touched Hagekagome lightly. “Would you help me in the stable?”

She bounced up, grinning, eager to help.

I looked to Tara Chayne for a reaction.

“You’re trying to be clever. Get your answers from your partner.”

Something smelled funny there.

“He’ll tell you what he thinks you need to know.”

And there it was. She thought Old Bones would keep me in the dark, too.

It made no sense.

But why did it have to now? A dab of patience would bring whatever knowledge I needed. I just hated waiting.

Playmate and the girl readied the horses. I installed Helenia aboard the mare, who finally betrayed her true self by nipping me.

Playmate, Hagekagome, and Helenia all barked at me when I popped the monster in the snot locker. Brownie put on the same look of disappointment that my mother used to get when she was unhappy about something that I’d done.

I asked her, “You weren’t my mom in another life, were you?”

Niea gasped, horrified, reminding us of his presence. Reincarnation theory was anathema to all true-believing Orthodox.

The mare just looked dumbfounded.

• • •

We delivered Helenia to the Al-Khar. Scithe did drop out there, too, only asking once if he could take Niea with him. He took “No” for an answer. The Specials faded away, too, probably because their shifts were up. We weren’t far along before I spotted Preston Womble again, though.

He didn’t care if he was seen, probably because he didn’t care what we were doing. He was working because he had been given no choice.

I chose to go past Frenkeljean’s roach wagon, where I treated everyone to sausages, including the mutts-though they got surplus that had been around too long for people to eat. Grease running up my arms, I told Tara Chayne, “Now, this is what I call good eating. Yo. Frenkle-man. Give me another one.”

Tara Chayne’s reaction to her sausage approximated mine to her pepper-based abomination. She took a few bites, made ladylike retching noises, and passed the rest to Number Two, who totally agreed with me. How could anybody not love a big old juice-dripping pork sausage?

Frenkeljean filled me in on local gossip. That didn’t take long. My activities hadn’t gotten any rumors started. Folks didn’t care what happened on the Hill as long as the Hill didn’t include outsiders as collateral damage.

It was an attitude I knew well. I’d shared it before Strafa came into my life.

From Prince Guelfo Square it was a short trek to Macunado, where several red tops deliberately showed themselves. I heard grumbling from neighbors who objected to the possibility of excitement.

Tough.

The Dead Man was awake. I began to feel him when we were a block away. He was playing ambush predator, but why wasn’t clear. He might not know that himself.

Penny opened the door. She said something nice to Moonblight, looked down to where I was trying to make the horses comfortable. She told Brownie, “I’ll get something for you guys in a minute.” To me, “Can you put them in back?”

I asked the air, “What happened to the real Penny Dreadful?”

Your Church friend is most intriguing.

“What have you got?”

It is too early to concern yourself. Do as Penny suggested.

“Huh?” Did she suggest something? I must have missed that.

The dogs! With exasperation.

That let me know that I really did have to get it together. A lapse so small shouldn’t trigger the impatience of someone normally little pressed for time. There must be a frustrating pattern.

Well, of course. Especially since I’d lost Strafa.

I kept recognizing it, then failing to do anything about it.

“Come on, girls. Follow me.” Down a narrow breezeway alongside the house stood gates into my garden and that of my neighbor to the left. I had not, literally, been back there for years. I expected masses of windblown trash and the rotted memory of a gate. I found neither.

The breezeway was clean. The gate was new. “That Singe,” I muttered. “She’s spooky efficient.”

The breezeway had been cleaned after someone had tuck-pointed the mortar on the side of the house. A few missed slate chips told me that some roof repairs had been made, too.

The girls and I found Dean on the back porch, juggling bowls. Penny was there to help, a pot in each hand. She must have opened the back door. Dean couldn’t budge it. It seldom gets used and is stubborn about sticking shut, then is tough to close again once you do get it open.

They set out four bowls of mutt grub in ridiculously generous portions. Penny’s pots held water. Somebody had gone out of his or her way while I was off earning a living. Sic. Such as that was.

The pay had been lousy lately, and, being self-employed, I had me a really cheap-ass boss.

Penny reddened slightly, patted a couple of canine heads on critters too busy to notice, grumbled, “Got to go answer the door.”

There was no point raising my concerns with Dean. That old boy has no shame when it comes to spending my money.

“You girls be sure to thank the nice man.” I glanced around, saw essentially a desert the size of a handkerchief. Dean had started an herb garden once upon a time but couldn’t keep it up. Singe kept talking about creating a fancy flower garden, but she never got past the talk. She was too busy.

Penny and I were too damned lazy, and I didn’t care, anyway.

Gardens are nice when somebody else does the planting, watering, weeding, and grooming. I used to hit the Royal Botanical Gardens about once a year, then more often after I hooked up with Strafa.

I went back around front wondering if we should put the horses back there, too, and arrived just in time to see Penny close the front door behind Dollar Dan Justice, then to spot a slowly moving Playmate, with a patently worried Hagekagome, turning onto Macunado off Wizard’s Reach.

With no audience but the girl, Play was revealing how weak he really was.

I should have a man-to-man with his dopey brother-in-law.

Accumulated circumstantial evidence suggested that the jerk just wanted Playmate to hurry up and die so he could get hold of the assets, sell them, and squander the proceeds on fool get rich schemes. He had done that with Play’s sister’s inheritance.