Dread Brass Shadows (24 page)

Only after I shut the door behind her did I recall how things had gone last time Winger visited. I had to see the Dead Man and couldn’t let her run amuck while I did. No telling what would leap into her pockets. “Come on. It’s time you met my partner.” I shouldn’t use that word so close to him. He’d make a point of bringing it up.

My partner was as thrilled to meet her as he’d be to be the star at a witch burning. Carla Lindo could charm him some, but even she was a woman, and I’d not be forgiven for having her around so long. Winger was something else. Say she lacked Carla Lindo’s grace.

“What the hell is that thing?”

“The Dead Man. My sidekick. Not as frisky as some, but he does his part. If you light a fire under him.”

“That ain’t no man, Garrett. That’s some kind of thing. Gots it a snoot like a mammoth. Gods, it’s ugly. Kind of ripe, too.” Like I said, a real charmer. All the sensitivity of a dire wolf.

Garrett!

We must have caught him dozing. I expected him to get peckish sooner. “News from the Cantard, Old Bones. Your boy maybe weaseled out one more time. Got the big boys butting heads . . .” He wasn’t going to buy.

This time you have gone too far! Why have you brought that creature into my home?

Oh-oh. He was piqued. He’s very precise in his word choices. If he had used my house, he’d just have wanted to squabble to kill time. My home . . . Well, he was not pleased. He felt violated.

“So I can keep an eye on her. Wouldn’t want some unscrupulous rake making a move on her before

Stuff that nonsense. Play that game with Dean if you like, but I know you better.

“Had you going there, didn’t I?”

Do what needs doing, then get her out.

Hey! He was willing to work to get shut of her. All right! I’d finally found a way to twist his arm.

Garrett!

“Right.”

Winger looked at me like I was foaming at the mouth.

The Dead Man wasn’t giving her his half of the conversation. She asked, “You talking to that thing?”

“Sure. He’s just dead, he isn’t gone.”

Report, Garrett! Get on with it.

I did. Every little detail.

I suggest you play along for the time being.
He let Winger catch that. She jumped about a foot, grabbed the sides of her head. Her eyes got big as she wondered if he could look inside there as easily as he put thoughts in. I think she would’ve attacked him if she hadn’t been so shocked.

“Play along Right. My sharpest skill. And when the crunch comes, how do I get out of committing murder? Or at least becoming a heavyweight accessory to same?”

The Dead Man sent the mental equivalent of a shrug.
You will manage. You always do. Tell me more about what has happened in the Cantard.

Back to normal. He had his bluff in again. He thought. How about you suggest a way I can keep them from killing me once I’ve helped with the dirty work.”

Really, Garrett. Your stubborn refusal to think for yourself is becoming a burden.
He paused.
Since you have developed a fondness for this Winger person, and she has the intent anyway, why not take her along? She has shown herself capable of handling one of them already. I foresee an unbeatable team here.

Did I walk into that one? I sprinted. And did all the setup work, too. I couldn’t raise a fuss without Winger maybe getting upset and busting me upside the head.

A hint of mental snicker, private, for me alone. The devil.

It wasn’t my day. It wasn’t my week. If I went along to help ice Chodo, it might not be my lifetime.

“Sounds good to me,” Winger said. It would. She’d already invited herself along once. Now she had the Dead Man’s blessing.

I noted that she had caught her balance fast. The Dead Man had become old news. She watched me expectantly, like she wondered how much originality I’d show trying to weasel out.

“I should’ve been a clown,” I grumbled. “I’m everybody’s entertainment anyhow.”

The Dead Man’s laughter was silent but evil.

Winger’s wasn’t silent.

I heard a sound, glanced back. Dean was in the doorway. Grinning.

My get-even list was getting too long to keep in my head. I was going to have to get me a diary to keep track.

37

I don’t know why I left the house after I got rid of Winger. I guess because the Dead Man was riding me with spurs on, digging them in deep. My joke about Winger had turned on me. I didn’t dare go to the kitchen without Dean ragging me, too.

Out seemed like a good idea at the time. Especially when the Dead Man said he’d like to know what Gnorst was up to now. I grabbed the out.

So I went to see the sneeze man. Actually, I just left a message at the door. Gnorst wasn’t receiving. I suspect he especially wasn’t receiving people with connections to old pals.

I headed for home. I got the notion I could root Carla Lindo out of her room and weep on her shoulder. She hadn’t ridden me. She’d been especially understanding, in fact. The more I thought about it, the more I was sure we were going to become great friends real soon now. I started getting high on anticipation.

You may have noticed that things have a way of catching up with me whenever I feel too positive. The god who hands out the towels in the heavenly loo has a sideline. Messing with Garrett. He’s such a puny, useless god they couldn’t find anything better for him to do. But he’s really good at messing with me. He works at it so hard I think he’s bucking for a promotion.

I was a block from my place, trotting toward Macunado on Wizard’s Reach. I stopped suddenly.

They came out of nowhere They closed in carefully.

There were six of them. I didn’t know them but they had to be Chodo’s boys.

The street cleared magically. I struck some martial-arts poses, made me some nifty yells. That just kept them from getting overconfident.

They were good. They would be, of course. Otherwise they wouldn’t be on the first team. And they’d been briefed on what to expect, which was to expect the unexpected. I’ve been known to yank tricks out of my sleeves.

Today I was fresh out, not counting the old-fashioned lie. I got one guy to turn his head by yelling, “Hey! Morley! Just in time for the party.”

That was the only good Morley did me all week, and he wasn’t even there. I laid that guy out with a flying kick and just kept going for about six feet. Then I was out of running room. A building jumped in my way.

They closed in. I hauled out my stick. We mixed it up. I dinged two pretty good. I wasn’t worrying about how bad I hurt them. They apparently wanted me alive. At least a little Nobody bothered explaining anything to anyone.

The scuffle lasted longer than they planned. Our dancing and prancing brought some of the bolder neighbors back outside, especially the kids. Some were kids I knew. Did they lend a hand? Did they run to the house to tell somebody I was in trouble? They did not.

These are the little people, the ones I thought needed a champion when I outfitted myself with creaky idealistic armor. Sometimes people make it damned hard to care about people. Sometimes they do their damnedest to make it seem they deserve whatever they get.

Oh, well. I made a showing till somebody got my stick away from me and tried it out on my skull.

A black pool opened at my feet . . .

I didn’t dive in. I sort of belly-flopped and floated there with my nose above the surface. I vaguely recall sagging between two thugs while a third summoned a waiting coach. The coach came. My buddies helped me dive inside. Somebody did a drumroll on my noggin, then they dumped their injured in on top of me.

My head stuck out of the pile. The guy with my stick tapped it every little bit, like he was trying out different patterns of lumps. I would fix him with some patterns of his own if I got the chance.

Even my skull has limits. I went off to dreamland.

The sandman isn’t all bad. Before we left the city, before I wakened with an all-time headache, he got rid of the three guys piled on top of me. Hell. I had it whipped. I outnumbered them now.

The headache was a memorable effort. At least I remembered it better than any I had before. I’d been thumped hard enough to generate a small concussion. I’d puked all over the coach floor Recently, too. The guy with the stick was still cussing me. His partner, riding with his back to the horses, observed, “You bopped him too many times. What you expect?”

“Hell, we’ll probably just end up croaking him. Why’d he got to go make a mess?”

“Inconsiderate of him.”

“Sure as hell was. I’m gonna gotta clean it up. I always get stuck with the shit jobs.”

A philosopher and a complainer. The philosopher said, “You don’t plan to go messy when your turn comes? You just going to take the hit and fold politely?”

“I ain’t going.” Sullenly.

The philosopher chuckled. How could a guy with his realist’s outlook stay in the niche he’d chosen? He said, “Least we know he ain’t dead yet. I never saw a stiff puke. I was worried Chodo’d have a litter if we delivered a deader.”

“Why? He’s gonna be dead anyway.”

“We don’t know that He didn’t say that.”

“Shit.”

“All right. There ain’t much doubt. But Chodo wants to talk to him first. To apologize, maybe. They used to be buddies or something.”

Or something. I’d never counted on Chodo’s gratitude being bottomless. I wondered if there was a connection between this and my chat with Sadler.

“Shit. He’s crazy,” the complainer said.

“Sure. And he’s the kingpin, too.”

Grumble grumble. Lots of use of that favorite four-letter word. I wondered if they knew I was awake. I wondered if I was being snookered.

The philosopher began rhapsodizing on the passing scenery. A nature lover. Some city boys get that way in the country. A plain old willow is a cause for wonder. His observations suggested we were on the road to Chodo’s place already. We were in some wooded hills, That meant we weren’t more than a mile or two from the place I was supposed to meet Crask and Sadler later. The woods would give way to vineyards on the north slopes, though there would still be patches of trees alongside the road. If I wanted to stay healthy, I ought to do something before we reached the vineyards. There wasn’t cover enough to make an escape over there.

Only my body didn’t feel like doing anything. Maybe next week. Maybe after the swelling went down.

It’s real hard to find much ambition after you’ve had your noggin used for a drum.

The way the horses were straining I guessed we were climbing Hornet Nest Hill, a long steep climb. Near the top the road makes a backward S-curve, climbing what amounts to a bluff, before it leaps the ridge and heads for the end of the woods. Perfect. I could dive out the door and over the side, roll down the hill, and disappear before these thugs could get their mouths closed. I told my body to get ready.

My body said go to hell. It wasn’t moving. Moving hurt.

The carriage stopped.

The complainer opened a door, asked, “What’s up?”

“I don’t know,” the driver told him. “The horses don’t want to go any farther.”

Say what? Me and horses don’t get along. If there’s any way for them to mess me around, they will. I couldn’t picture them not galloping all the way to carry me to my execution. Unless they wanted to mess with me some themselves before letting Chodo have me. . . . Hell. I couldn’t keep that game going. I felt too lousy.

The philosopher edged the complainer out of the doorway. “Hang on, Mace. Don’t push them. Maybe they know something.” He got out of the coach. His buddy followed him. “Could be that shoemaker’s bunch. Was I to set an ambush, I’d put it right up there, just before the top. Where the cut is, with the drop on the right. Leaves you nowhere to duck

They debated. The sullen one tossed in two sceats worth of let’s get rolling, there ain’t no damned ambush. The philosopher suggested, “Why don’t you go up and look?”

They argued. The complainer sneered. “Candyass! I’ll show you.” I heard his feet crunch the road surface. He sent opinions back meant to keep the curl in the philosopher’s hair.

Come on, Garrett! This is it. They’ve handed it to you. All you have to do is fall through a door and roll down a hill. Or the other way around. You have the necessary skills.

My body told me, all right, I’ll let you open one eye.

I did. I couldn’t see squat because I wasn’t facing the door.

The driver observed, “Something’s up. He’s slowing down.” Like maybe the philosopher had bad eyes.

The philosopher called, “What is it, Winsome?”

I wished I had the energy to laugh. Winsome? Was that a nickname?

Did I have a death wish? The philosopher was talking from near the head of the team. They were handing me it on a platter and all I could do was turn my head enough to look outside and see that we were exactly where I’d guessed.

Come on, Garrett!

I reached back for the old reserves and found I had enough to lever myself up enough to see that they hadn’t dressed me up in ropes or shackles. I could leap up and dash away after leaving my dreaded mark slashed into the property of the evildoers.

Winsome yelled something about a bad smell.

I heard a footstep. Cunning me, I lay down where I’d been and made like a guy who was going to snore for another week. The philosopher must not have watched many guys come back from a thumping. He bought it.

He pulled an illegal sword from beneath his seat, told the driver, “Don’t move,” and went stomping up the road.

The driver cussed the horses. The animals were getting restless.

My body began to yield to my will. I got onto my knees slowly so as not to rock the coach and alert the driver. I looked out the open door at the woods. I don’t usually have much use for the country, but from where I knelt at that moment ticks and chiggers and poison ivy didn’t sound bad at all. I eased forward, poked my head out far enough to look uphill.

One guy was almost to the top. He seemed uncomfortable. Only his brags were keeping him up there. The other was striding toward him, sword in hand.