Sharps (60 page)

Eight weeks later, Iseutz was upstairs in the morning room when the maid told her she had a visitor. She put down her embroidery and went downstairs. Addo was sitting awkwardly in the hall, in a chair far too small for his legs. He stood up when he saw her.

“Hello,” he said.

He looked different. He was, of course, dressed entirely in black. Even the silver buckles of his shoes had been allowed to tarnish, or else they’d been dipped in vinegar, to darken them. But his hair was short and neat, and his various scars were shiny red patches instead of scabs. He looked older.

“Hello,” Iseutz replied. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to see you,” Addo said.

“Oh. Well, we’d better go in the garden.”

“Fine.”

Just as well that her parents were away. A son of the Carnufex, in their house; they’d have died of sheer aspiration. And he looked rather more the son of the Carnufex than she was used to: clean, looked after, not bloody. But he was still recognisably Addo, and for some reason her hands wanted to shake, though of course she didn’t let them.

“Well,” she said, as she pointed him at the bench under the window. “What do
you
want?”

She hadn’t meant it to come out quite like that, but he didn’t seem to mind. He smiled. “Settling in all right?” he asked.

“Bored out of my head, actually,” she replied. Then she took a breath and said, “I heard about your father.”

“I assumed you would’ve done.”

“I’m sorry.”

Addo shrugged. “So am I,” he replied. “Which is strange. Actually …” He was looking past her, at the horrible little marble cherub fountain in the middle of the lawn. Offences against taste of that kind, she imagined, were probably not a part of his everyday experience. If there had been a sledgehammer handy, she’d have smashed it there and then. “Actually,” he went on, “that was why I wanted to see you.”

A total non sequitur, but also the only possible reason. She found it hard to breathe; a bit like drowning. Now there, she thought, is irony. “How did it happen?” she heard herself ask.

Addo frowned. “Our steward told me,” he said, “that he drowned in the carp pond.” He paused, as if preparing for an important speech. “Father loved painting and sketching. He always took his paints and his sketchbook with him on campaign. He was good at it, too, particularly landscapes. Well, there’s a marvellous view out over the valley from the top of the old column.” He smiled, looking away from her. “It’s a sort of folly thing. One of my ancestors with even worse delusions of grandeur than usual had it built after he got back from his grand tour of the Empire. There’s a family legend that he even hired a little man from the village to sit on top of it, like the lunatic hermits used to do, though personally I don’t believe it. Even our lot wouldn’t do anything that stupid.”

Iseutz opened her mouth, then closed it again.

“Anyhow,” Addo continued, “the carp pond is directly under the column, and what they believe is that Father was up at the top, and a freak gust of wind caught him and blew him off. He landed in the pond, the shock of hitting the water stunned him, and he drowned. They found the painting he’d been doing floating on the water, but the easel was up on top of the column, so it’s a fairly plausible hypothesis.”

Something in the tone of his voice made her skin crawl, but she couldn’t figure out what it was. “I’m sorry,” she said. “It seems …”

“Yes?”

“It seems such a trivial way for him to die,” she said. “A horrible, stupid accident. I mean, it could’ve happened to just anybody. Sorry,” she added quickly, “that wasn’t a helpful thing to say.”

“That’s all right,” Addo said briskly. “And you’re quite right. It’s the appropriate death for a minor country squire. All wrong for the Irrigator. He should’ve died in battle, of course, at the very moment of victory. Sword in hand, in the arms of his loyal and heartbroken second-in-command, with all the senior staff gathered round in suitable attitudes of desolation. That’s how it always is in the paintings, we’ve got stuff like that on half the ceilings in the house. Death with a degree of purpose, death that achieves something; otherwise it’s just such a stupid bloody waste, don’t you think?”

She wanted to reach out, take his hand, something like that. But she found she couldn’t. It was the same sort of strong reluctance that would’ve stopped her taking hold of something she had reason to believe was burning hot. “These things happen,” she heard herself say, and wished she hadn’t.

“Actually.” Addo stood up. He looked like he was about to run; like a calf suspecting it’s about to be grabbed and roped. “Actually,” he said, in a harder voice than she’d ever heard him use, “it wasn’t like that at all. In fact, he died in the very best traditions of the family. Quite possibly the best thing he ever did. At least, I very much hope so.” He turned and looked at her, and it was like looking at a dead man, a drowned man: white and eyes bleached, inhuman. “I killed him,” he said.

It was as though he was talking to her in a different language, one she didn’t understand. “Addo?”

“I killed him,” he repeated. “There’s a big pipe that drains the water out of the pond, with a tap. We like to change the water now and again, to keep the pond from getting green and stinking. Couple of the men go down with nets and pick up the fish while they’re thrashing about in the mud, put them in great big barrels; then there’s a sluice you can open that brings water down from the mill race, to fill the pond up again. The night before, I crept out and opened the tap, drained out all the water. In the morning, early, I went for a walk, found the pond empty and all the fish dead, went back to the house, told Father. He was livid, of course; figured out it must’ve been done deliberately, went up to take a look. While he was examining the tap, I hit him over the head with a stone, knocked him out. I dragged his body into the middle of the pond bed, then ran up and opened the sluice. He never woke up. The water just flowed round him, and over him, and that was that. I’d stolen his painting stuff; I threw in a half-finished picture and his brushes and palette, and I put the easel up on the top of the column, where I’d be able to discover it later and solve the mystery. When the pond was full, I closed up the sluice, then ran back to the house all shaking and distraught. Didn’t need to pretend much, of course, which helped, because I’m not a very good actor.”

“Addo.” Her throat felt as though it had been crushed. “Why?”

He turned away again. “Sorry to be a pest,” he said, “but have you by any chance got anything to drink around here? My throat’s a bit sore. Thanks,” he said, as she poured him some water. He took the glass but didn’t actually drink. “You want to know why I killed him.”

“Yes. Addo …”

“Because it was the right thing to do.” He put the glass down carefully on a table. “For his sake as much as anything. You know he wanted to take over, make himself dictator.”

“No, actually, I didn’t.”

Addo shrugged. “He thought,” he said calmly, “that that was the only way to save Scheria – take charge, get rid of the Bank, start a war, beat the Permians, use their money to pay off the debts, and then it’d be back to how it was in the old days, which was his definition of the perfect society.” He frowned, as if deciding on a fine and difficult point of trivia. “I don’t think he
wanted
power necessarily,” he went on, “he just arrived at the conclusion that he was the best person to have it, and once he’d decided that, everything else followed logically on. Anyway, he was hell-bent on there being another war, which he was certain we’d win. He could well have been right about that,” he went on, “but he was wrong about the rest of it. He’d have been a really terrible dictator. Too good a soldier, you see. He’d have expected everybody to follow orders, immediately and without question. When they didn’t – well, it wouldn’t have been pleasant. And the end result would’ve been that he’d have destroyed Scheria, made everybody’s lives utterly wretched, and gone down in history not as the finest general of his generation and the best of the Carnufex – which is what he was, no doubt about it – but as just another military adventurer who seized power and then made a mess of trying to use it. He’d have thrown away everything he ever achieved, and he’d have ruined the country instead of saving it; and he cared about Scheria, really and truly he did. So I killed him.” He closed his eyes, then opened them and grinned. “For his own good.”

“Addo …”

“And to stop him from starting another stupid, horrible war.” Addo rubbed his eyes with forefinger and thumb. “Well, that’s probably another issue, and there’s stuff about that I won’t bore you with. But basically, that’s why. I loved him, more than anybody else in the world. So, what else could I do?”

“You
killed
—” She stopped. “Addo …”

“What do you want me to say?” He’s exhausted, she thought. He doesn’t need another fight. “The way I see it, one of us was going to do a terrible thing. I decided it had better be me. After all, I’m the expendable one, he made that perfectly clear, and I agree with him.” He paused and looked straight at her, as if down the blade of a rapier in high first. “What do you think I should do? If I confess, it’d be the ruin of our family. I don’t know if they’d hang me or not. Probably not, if I explained why I did it, but that’d defeat the object of the exercise. It wouldn’t being him back, that’s for sure. It might make me feel better, to go to the gallows for what I’ve done. Rather noble, don’t you think? Very Carnufex.” He raised his voice a little, as though reciting. “I loved my father, but I loved Scheria more.” He shook his head. “But then I’d be the hero, and that’d be all wrong. I’m the hero’s son, the one who does what has to be done. It’s a fine distinction, but quite essential.”

She stared at him: Addo, who she’d shared a coach with, played chess with, who’d taken her seriously, and now he’d done this. It was a monstrous thing.

(Almost as monstrous as what Giraut had done, but she’d forgiven him: because he’d been weak and scared, because it was practically an accident, which made the Senator’s death empty and meaningless. There was no point trying to punish Addo. Nobody in the world could do that half as well as he was going to do it, for the rest of his life. And what he’d done was
right
, and his motives had been good; and she’d killed others simply to preserve her own life, which was of no value whatesoever …)

“It’s all right,” she said.

“Excuse me?” He almost sounded angry. “It’s most definitely not all right. It was—”

“Addo, be quiet.” His eyebrows shot up, and he looked at her. “It’s all right,” she said. “It was the most appalling thing to do, but you had to do it. To stop a war. And for his sake. If anyone else had done it, I’d approve, I’d say he was a good man who’d done the right thing. It’s just a shame it had to be you, but of course it couldn’t have been anyone else, could it? You did it for kindness. You’re a kind man, it’s the best thing about you. You don’t want people to suffer.”

He was quiet for a long time; then he said: “He’d have suffered, no doubt about it. As soon as he realised he’d made a terrible mistake, and there was no way back from it. He’d have torn himself apart. And there wasn’t any other way. He wasn’t the sort of man you could
talk
to.” He jumped up, got as far away from her as he could without opening a door. “I’m so sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have made you listen to this. It was selfish, and I apologise.”

That made her smile, and the smile pulled on her lip and made her squeal. Now look what you’ve made me do. “That’s all right,” she said. “Really.”

“There’s nobody else I could …” He shook his head. “Thanks,” he said. “I won’t bother you again.”

“I doubt that.” She heard it before she realised she’d said it. He looked round at her, desperate and frightened. “What did you come here for, Addo? To confess your sins?”

“No.”

“Sit down, for pity’s sake, before you knock something over.”

He grinned and sat down, folding his ridiculously long legs neatly out of the way. “What did you come for?” she asked.

“Well.” He was looking down at his feet. She wanted to hit him. “If you must know, I was going to ask you if you felt like getting married. But that’s—”

“That’s fine,” she said.

He looked at her. “What?”

“That’s fine,” she said firmly. “Not ideal, but yes, on balance, I think so.”

He sat perfectly still for an infuriatingly long time, then nodded. “If you’re sure.”

“No, I suddenly changed my mind. Yes, I’m sure. Oh for crying out loud, Addo,” she snapped, “look at me when I’m telling you I love you.”

Given the circumstances, the wedding was a fairly low-key affair. It was held at the Carnufex house: seven hundred and twenty-six guests, not counting the tenants, the musicians and the entertainment, which was provided by the students and instructors of the Deutzel school. Suidas Deutzel didn’t attend in person; he pleaded pressure of work and sent his chief instructor, Giraut Bryennius, to represent him and make sure the show went off well, which it did. After the fencing there was a general exodus into the rose garden, but Giraut stayed behind. So did Jilem Phrantzes, who’d been deliberately avoiding Giraut all day.

“Hello,” Phrantzes said. “Haven’t seen you since …”

“No,” Giraut said. “How’s everything? Your wife?”

“She’s fine,” Phrantzes replied. “Couldn’t be here today, not with the baby due any day now. You?”

“Oh, not so bad.” Giraut smiled. “Working for a living, but otherwise I can’t complain.”

Phrantzes nodded. “How is Suidas these days? I haven’t seen him.”

“Oh, he’s fine,” Giraut said. “Having a great time running the school and not having to fence. He told me the other day he always hated fencing. But it was the one thing he was good at, so he had to.”

Phrantzes nodded gravely. “I gather he’s marrying that actress of his.”

“At last, yes.” Giraut smiled. “He told me she agreed to marry him as soon as he could show her forty thousand nomismata in the Bank. The day he cleared forty thousand and seven nomismata and twelve quarters, he went out and booked the Temple. That’s what he told me, anyhow. Don’t know if it’s true, but it sounds like it should be.”