Blondie said, "We understand you're often involved in unusual affairs."

"I'm a lightning rod for weird stuff. Thanks, Dean." The big tray carried the right number of cups, cookies and m.u.f.fins, and a steaming pot of tea. The boys exchanged glances, nervous under Eleanor's piercing gaze and Dean's stern disapproval.

Dean left. I poured and asked, "What can I do for you guys? Really."

They exchanged glances again.

"Look, boys, I'm working hard here." The G.o.dd.a.m.n Parrot squawked in my ear. "If you just need a place to get in out of the rain I recommend Mrs. Cardonlos' rooming house up the street. On the other..."

"Awk! Queen b.i.t.c.h! Queen b.i.t.c.h!"

"It's not raining." Literal-minded clerks.

"Stow it, bird," I growled at the G.o.dd.a.m.n Parrot.

My visitors exchanged looks again.

This could go on all day.

7.

The blond said, "I apologize, Mr. Garrett. We were cautioned that we might find you unconventional and should try to become comfortable with that before proceeding."

"Puny p.e.n.i.s!" the parrot squawked.

I snarled, "You're going into the sack again, you animated feather duster."

The brunette smiled insincerely. "Is that ventriloquism? When I was little I had an uncle who could-"

"Why does everybody ask that? No. This devil-sp.a.w.n of a seven-color jungle pigeon does it all on his own. He's got a vocabulary bigger than yours or mine and every word is foul. Fowl. Maybe there was sorcery done him sometime. I don't know. He was a gift. I can't seem to get rid of him."

"Pencil d.i.c.k."

Now n.o.body was smiling. Again I thought about choking the Dead Man, only what good would that do? Strengthen my grip?

The blond said, "My name is Carter Stockwell."

So we were going to do business after all. "I'm not surprised. And you?"

"Trace Wendover."

"Of course. h.e.l.lo, Carter and Trace. Sure you don't want a talking parrot? Cheap? Make a great holiday gift for the kids."

Garrett, once again I must caution you against antagonizing these men.

"No? All right. I made my sales pitch. Your loss. You guys make yours. Or go away."

"We were told you might be ill-mannered." That was the darker one. Trace.

Carter said, "Our mission is to interest you in contributing to our cause."

"Right now I've got about six copper sceats to clink together. The only cause I'm going to contribute to is the Garrett household supper fund."

"We don't want money. Please. Give us a chance to talk."

"You've been here ten minutes. You haven't said anything yet."

"You're right. We are Free Company men. Black Dragon Valsung." Carter watched for my reaction.

"What's that?" I asked.

Trace countered, "You don't know the Dragons?"

"Sorry." Heeding the Dead Man's advice I forebore remarks that might betray my feelings about those quasi-military gangs called Free Companies. There are so many of them that not having heard of a particular one was no big deal.

"Our leader is Colonel Valsung. Norton Valsung." I got intent looks from both pretty boys.

I shrugged. "Doesn't ring a bell, guys. He must have been army."

Carter began to puff up. He'd caught the slight. Trace, though, was made of sterner stuff. "Yes, Mr. Garrett. Colonel Valsung was army. He commanded the Black Dragon Brigade." Trace tossed him a warning look but he continued, "You would be impressed if you were to review his record."

No doubt. War does tend to expose men for what they really are. "Wouldn't be a relative, would he?"

"My uncle."

"The ventriloquist? I recall several colonels who were masters at putting words into other people's mouths."

"No, Mr. Garrett. Not that uncle."

"We're getting somewhere now. We have a colonel who isn't a ventriloquist. What does your uncle the nonventriloquist want with me?"

"Your peculiar combination of talents and expertise, both from your service and your career since."

I didn't get it. "You need a Force Recon guy with experience ducking vampires and sorcerers and tracking wayward wives to help you beat up old dwarves and crippled ratmen?"

Garrett!

Both of my visitors turned red. But Carter was out in front because he'd gotten a head start. Trace said, "Mr. Garrett, we do not roam the streets a.s.saulting people. We are a veterans' mutual a.s.sistance brotherhood, not a street gang."

"The other day a veteran, who'd done five five-year hitches, three in the Cantard, was almost beaten to death right outside. He'd won eight decorations, including the Imperial Star with Swords and Oak Leaves. In one battle he lost half of his left arm and most of that side of his face in a blast from a witch ward. He's in the Bledsoe now. He probably won't get out alive. Those butchers won't pay any attention to him. He doesn't have any money. Go down there and mutually a.s.sist him. His name is Brate Trueblood."

"But the Bledsoe is a charity hospital, isn't it?"

"You didn't grow up in TunFaire, did you? In this town charity is available only to those who can pay for it."

"No. That's ugly." Trace seemed genuinely touched. Carter obviously didn't care but was cooling down. "That's exactly why we have to band together."

"But there's a problem, Trace. Brate was a real hero and as good a soldier as ever soldiered. Unfortunately, he made one really huge, stupid mistake."

My visitors looked at me expectantly.

Garrett, please! Stop now. The Dead Man seemed almost to despair. The Dead Man seemed almost to despair.

"He was so stupid he picked an ogre for one of his grandparents."

It took them a while to catch on. I watched their eyes narrow and go shifty as they figured it out. Carter was slowest but he was the first to stand up. He told me, "You have the wrong idea." And, "Trace, we're wasting our time here."

"You're not wasting your time, Carter," I said. "I just want you to understand that nothing is black-and-white." I tried to hold Trace's eye. He seemed to be mulling my parable. "What did you guys do down there? You were clerks, right? Your uncle got you some safe a.s.signment, right? Trace? Carter? You had an angel, too? So who do you suppose did more to defend and preserve the Karentine Crown? You guys or my ugly quadroon?"

Carter said, "You really don't know what's happening, do you?" And that actually seemed to please him.

I left my chair, moved to the office doorway. "You aren't wasting your time, guys. I'm right behind you. I just need to know how to reconcile the Brate Truebloods."

Trace started to say something. Carter squeezed his arm.

In moments those earnest young men were back in the street. Carter, I was convinced, would ignore my story, which was true only in a moral sense anyway. There really is a Brate Trueblood but he was just a small hero and the thugs who jumped him didn't put him in the hospital. Ogre blood made him hard to hurt. But these two creeps did want Brate in the Bledsoe. Or worse.

I might have done the devil's work with Trace, though. He looked like a young man who might, on occasion, actually have a thought.

I whistled as I bolted the door, blissful in my ignorance.

8.

That was not one of your more salubrious performances, Garrett. That flake of moral hubris may come back to haunt you.

"Come on! They're jerks. Especially the blond one."

Their minds did not reflect the prejudice you expect. But such jerks are quite common today. They are aggrieved. They need targets for their frustration. Those two seemed to be fundamentally good men...Yet- "Yet? What?"

They had no depth. Even a mind as dim as Saucerhead Thorpe's has its deeps.

"No kidding? They're a couple of pretty boys who never worked a day-"

Not shallow, Garrett. Not that way. Just all surface. Inside. Humans are filled with turmoil. Continuous dark currents collide and roil down deep where you do not see them and do not know them. Always. Even in Mr. Thorpe or Miss Winger. But those two had nothing beneath the fanatic surface. And that fanaticism was not as narrow and blind as is common. They grasped your Trueblood parable. They seemed unable to deal with it only because doing so would not have been in character.

Well, he'd lost me. Except for the part about being all surface. "That don't surprise me. I know those guys. I' ve seen a lot of them. They just give up everything and let somebody else do their thinking. Life is easier that way."

Perhaps. But I have a strong intuition that we would have been better served had you held them here whilst I milked them rather than driving them away.

"Milked them? I didn't hear a moo from either one."

Intentional obtuseness seldom finds a complimentary acute observation. You should have probed them for information. You should have held them while I wormed in under their surfaces. He refused to let me exasperate him more than I had already. He refused to let me exasperate him more than I had already. Their particular Free Company may finance itself by extorting funds in the name of The Call. But we are in no position to winkle that out now. Are we? Their particular Free Company may finance itself by extorting funds in the name of The Call. But we are in no position to winkle that out now. Are we?

I hate it when he's right. And he was right. I let my emotions take over. I hadn't thought of those two in relation to the Weider problem. Yet they could have had that in mind. One of their cronies might have noticed the girls coming to my place.

Your problem far too often, Garrett.

"Huh?"

You do not think. You emote. You act on that emotion in preference to reason. However, there was nothing in their minds to tie them in to the Weider matter. Which, of course, is no guarantee that those who sent them are equally innocent.

"Aha! They knew about you."

Those two did not. They knew nothing about you, either, except what they had been told. I believe you m.u.f.fed this one, Garrett.

I don't know about that. They probably wanted me to work. But I sighed. He really was right. And I definitely hate that. I hear about it forever. "I think I'll just go over to the brewery and-"

Yes. You should do that. But not right away. Go later. After the night crew comes in. They will be the younger men who have the Cantard more freshly in mind. If there are human rights activists there, they are most likely to be found among the younger workers.

What could I say? When he's right he's right. And he has been right a little too often lately. "All right. What're you going to suggest instead?" There would be something.

See Captain Block. Ask him about The Call. Let fall some gentle intimation of the threat to Mr. Weider.

Captain Westman Block runs the Guard, TunFaire's half-a.s.s police force. The Guard is lame but more effective than the predecessor from which it evolved, the Watch, which existed primarily to absorb bribes to stay out of the way. The Watch still exists but only as a fire brigade.

The reason the Guard works is a little guy who is part dwarf, a touch of several other things, and maybe an eighth human. His name is Relway. He's the ugliest man I've ever met. He's obsessed with law and order. His conversations all revolve around his New Order, by which he means the absolute rule of law. When I met him, on a rainy night not that long ago, he was a volunteer "auxiliary" helping Block's tiny serious-crimes section of the Watch. I said something unpleasant to Relway that night. He a.s.sured me that I ought to be less unpleasant because he was going to be an important fellow before long.

His powers of prophecy were excellent.

Prince Rupert created the Guard and installed Westman Block as its chief. Then Block sanctioned Relway. And Relway immediately put together a powerful and nasty secret police force consisting of people who thought his way. Offenders have been known to just vanish once they attract the notice of Relway's section.

Probably no more than a thousand people know the section exists. He doesn't blow his own horn. And I'd bet there aren't more than a dozen people who can identify Relway by sight.

I'm one of them. Sometimes that makes me nervous.

That all rips through my mind whenever anyone mentions Block. I get the exact feeling Relway wants everybody to feel-that somebody is watching.

Old Man Weider is one of TunFaire's leading subjects. He's a commoner but is rich and powerful and influential. He has friends in high places who are real friends simply because he is the kind of man he is. Block would take an extra step to protect him.

Relway, being what he is, might take a few steps more if The Call was involved.

"Maybe that's all I really need to do. Get the Guard on the case. Block has more resources."

There is more going on.

"Why am I not surprised to hear that?"