Muttering, he headed up front. I poured tea. Singe and John Stretch hit the m.u.f.fins, fattening up for the winter.

Dean returned, his sneer restored. "Mr. Tharpe is here, sir."

Saucerhead filled the office doorway. He looked scared, an eventuality rare as rocs' eggs. "You got a back way out, Garrett?"

"What's up? What did you do?"

"I didn't do nothin' but what you told me. Which you owe me for. It's all your fault."

"Whoa, big guy. Put some blinders on that mule. And back the cart up to where it started."

"You told me to go catch that Penny Dreadful kid. So I did. No sooner do I lay hands on her, though, than she starts yelping rape an' sodomy an' incest an' all that s.h.i.t." Which didn't bother him nearly as much as the fact that, "An' people listened listened. You hear me talking, Garrett? People listened listened. An' not only that, some a them come an' tried to help her! An' not only that that, they chased me when I gave it up as a bad job an' decided to go away."

"That what the crowd noise out front is all about?"

"I don't know. They's probably getting all rowdy an' s.h.i.t because they want you to come out an' teach them to dance the dublarfared. You being a famous dancer."

I shook my head. I took a deep breath, sighed. I shook my head again. What was the world coming to? When did TunFairens start caring what happened to one of the city's countless feral brats?

Saucerhead blubbered, "This is all your fault, Garrett! Ever since you got in this investigation racket you been doing the meek-are-gonna-inherit polka. An' now half the burg is buying into your do-gooder c.r.a.p."

"It won't last," I promised, despairing of his ever grasping the do-gooder point. "Too much social inertia. Too many people too vested in the old ways. Especially up on the Hill. Just take it easy. They'll get bored and go away. Dean. Did you get Belinda off all right?"

He admitted that he had. And that she hadn't attracted any attention. Meaning the watchers outside figured her for one of my sleepover friends. Meaning, further, that I'd have some explaining to do once Tinnie got word.

She always does.

"Long as you're all here and don't have anything better to do. Listen to this." I told the tale of my visit to Brother Bittegurn Brittigarn's temple of Eis and Igory.

I hadn't gotten BB pinned down about his own religious att.i.tudes. Dean pointed that out. Smugly.

Singe wanted to see the roc's egg.

They all did. I let them pa.s.s it around.

John Stretch said, "That priest pulled your leg, Garrett. This rock came out of a creek bed. You can get a thousand just like it at the arms bazaar."

Singe said, "Our ancestors collected slingers' shot for the army."

The sling was never an official weapon in any Karentine formation, but both sides employed native auxiliaries in the Cantard, some so backward they considered the sling a technological marvel of such murderous capacity that the G.o.ds themselves would rail against its use.

There was universal agreement. My roc's egg was a rock and BB would still be snickering.

There was a racket at the front door. Saucerhead jumped. He developed a haunted look. Scowling about the injustice, Dean headed for the bows of the Garrett barge.

He came right back to announce, "Just neighborhood rabble. Did you want to talk to them?"

"No. If you took in dogs instead of cats, we could set those on them."

The monster in my lap stirred, but only to wriggle into a more comfortable position.

John Stretch asked, "Does it look like a long siege? I need to get back. My people have a knack for mischief."

Dean shrugged. "I don't know. But Mr. Garrett is right. Eventually, they'll get bored and go away."

Once my pals in the Watch started rumors that would make the idiots decide that home-cooked food was more interesting than hanging around shouting obscenities about a fake complaint.

Oops. Suppose Relway's Runners s.n.a.t.c.hed the girl?

"Hey, Saucerhead," I said. "What happened to Winger and her pet?"

Tharpe sneered. "Closed chapter, buddy. Winger is all after a fisa... fiso... something collalogistical of some kind who wants to shove things up our..."

I shuddered, absent the remotest notion. If I understood him at all, Winger was right and we needed to hunt down somebody who found that stuff exciting. Whatever it was.

I said, "That's interesting." Like I meant it. "This has been one of the longer days of my life. Thanks to these two villains." I pointed an indicting finger at Singe and Dean. "They started on me before the worms came out looking for the early birds. I'm so tired now that I probably won't go over to the factory tonight."

Singe said, "Tinnie is not finished being mad at you. You should stay away till she's ready to accept your apology."

"And when she hears about Belinda?" Life gets complicated if you get too engaged with it.

Dean sneered.

Saucerhead asked, "How was you figuring on getting out? On account of I still need to get out of here myself."

"Just wait till they get bored."

"There's still plenty of racket out there."

I shrugged. Tired was wearing me down. Also, that hint of the weird closing in that I'd begun to feel as soon as I came home.

Crash! Thunder shook the house. Stuff fell off my desk. Eleanor's portrait wobbled and ended up at a steep tilt. Dean dashed off to the kitchen. My ears rang. I hadn't heard anything fall out there but probably only because I couldn't hear.

Singe's eyes went wide with terror. John Stretch's, too. The primal rat took over. They didn't run only because there was nowhere to go.

Melondie Kadare was out cold.

"That was a close one," I said. My voice sounded weird to me. I felt rather than heard the thunder rumble off into the distance. "That must have hit down here in the neighborhood."

Saucerhead grunted feebly.

I've never been bothered by thunder and lightning. I find a good lightning show enjoyable. But I'd seldom had the hobnailed boot of a G.o.d slam down quite so close. "That ought to break up the mob out front, Saucerhead."

He couldn't hear me, but the idea occurred to him on its own. He got moving toward the front door.

Dean returned, half of his favorite teapot dangling from his right forefinger. There were tears in his eyes.

A second peal of thunder started way off to the east and stumbled toward us, roared overhead, hugely loud, then ambled on westward, diminuendo. Soon afterward a lightning symphony opened to a vast audience.

Then some antic vandal of a boy G.o.d knocked open the sluice gates of heaven. The rain came. Torrents hammered the house.

Kittens poked their noses out of hiding places. Well. The world was still here.

Saucerhead came back. "That broke them up. Man, you got to see the hailstones coming down." He was more awed than frightened now.

I went to look.

Tharpe was right. It was an awesome show, the lightning flailing around, thunder's hammers pounding the anvil of the sky, hail coming in a downpour heavier than any I'd ever seen.

People always exaggerate the size of hailstones. That's human nature. So I'll say only that there were tons of them, they were big, and on the ricochet they knocked over carts and wagons. Then daring, enterprising, dim-witted youths. .h.i.t the street with buckets and baskets, harvesting the ice while it still hammered down.

A flash almost blinded me. Thunder's roar came a heartbeat later, so strong I felt it right through my body. Had gangs of stormwardens decided to rumble? My ex-army pals claim they saw a lot of this sort of thing in the main war theater.

There were material as well as social advantages to being a Marine. Marines on swampy islands in the Gulf didn't have to worry about getting caught between dueling sorcerers. Sorcerers, on both sides, didn't mind cruel and deadly warfare, but they refused to become physically uncomfortable while they were fighting.

Saucerhead pushed past behind me. "I might freeze or drown, but I'm getting while I can get."

I had a couple of kittens underfoot, trying to figure out what hailstones were. They weren't impressed.

I asked, "You want a cat?"

Tharpe gave me a look colder than a bushel of hailstones.

"They're cute."

He left me with a one-finger salute.

29.

Once again I got up earlier than was rational. Since I'd gone to bed early, though, I missed no sleep. I just didn't regain what I'd lost the day before.

Everybody else was up before me. Of course. Go figure. And they were all in good moods, despite wet and windy weather. Dean had a warm fire going. I settled in and observed professionally while he continued to deal with the storm damage. "How much do we need to replace?"

"I'm making a list. Not a lot. We had too much to begin with, since we never entertain." He produced tea in a cracked beaker. I drank.

"What's Singe up to?"

"She and her brother are in talking to the thing."

"The thing? Old Jolly woke up? Why didn't you say so?"

"It may be old age confusing me. I thought I just did. The fury of the storm woke him up."

I didn't buy that. Now I knew why I'd felt weird after I got home yesterday. Old Bones was awake and lying back in the weeds.

"Give me a refill, here, and I'll be off."

He muttered something about my not needing any tea to get there.

Singe had half the lamps in the house in the Dead Man's room. He makes her nervous. Though I don't know many people who are comfortable around corpses. Particularly around corpses still inhabited by the original occupants, like a ghost that can't get up and walk.

Asking what kind of mood he was in would waste time. Ill-tempered usually covered it. Instead, I asked, "Where are the cats?"

"Hiding," Singe said. "They are terrified."

"Makes sense. In his time His Nibs was known as Terror of Kittens."

John Stretch eyed me like he wasn't sure I was joking. He was rattled. If he were human, he'd have been a bloodless white.

"You sure he's awake?" I asked. "I've been in here a whole minute and he hasn't contradicted me yet."

There are matters of greater weight to consider, Garrett. A dozen minds in the street outside need examination. Employing a pickpocket's touch inasmuch as they believe that I am no longer viable.

"Ah. Were you ever?"

And still the man wonders why I prefer sleep to suffering his company.

He was employing one of his lesser minds to communicate. He didn't have his heart behind his snaps. He was distracted. Which was a good sign. He'd found this new world exciting enough to engage his intellect.

Here is what you must do. Beginning immediately. Have Mr. Tharpe and Ms. Winger come see me. Employing your considerable talent for fabrication, get each of the following to visit, as well. Colonel Block and Deal Relway. Miss Contague. The child, Penny Dreadful. Any of the men who wear green pants. Or their handlers. The priest you visited. Teacher White or one of his henchmen.

Once I have interviewed a few of them it should become possible to develop strategies. Finding Mr. Contague and Mr. Temisk will be critical. Those two will be able to clarify the developing shakeout in organized crime.

That's the Dead Man. He goes on and on. And on. The bottom line is legwork for me.

Where is the bird? I do not sense the parrot.

"Gone," I said. I tried to sound thrilled, but the truth is, I do miss the foulmouthed chicken. Just a little. In rare, maudlin moments.

Ah. An interesting turn of events. Most of which I am thankful to have missed.

"You didn't miss much."

Do you honestly believe you can mislead me?

"I don't remember who, but somebody said that where there's life, there's hope."

My cousin Duphel said it first.

"What?"