squint up at the sky.
About the time they began to gather their tools, a cab-a clean black glass-windowed cab, from the good part of town-rattled up to the curb, and my own Mister Nervous Hat climbed out, coins in his hand for the driver.
He saw me. I grinned, stood and yelled for the cabbie to hold for another fare.
Nervous Hat gulped and dropped a pair of jerks.
I stepped over, bent, scooped them up.
“Here you are, Ronnie,” I said, handing them to him. “How are things with all the Sacks, these days?”
The driver, who by now knew something was up, snatched the coins away and scowled.
“I ain’t got time for this,” he growled, producing a wrought-iron truncheon from beneath his seat and banging it down hard beside him. “I’m leavin’. You want a ride, get in.”
I doffed my hat to Ronnie in a grand gesture of farewell. “Do tell your masters I said hello,” I said, as I opened the cab’s door. “They’ll be pleased to know you kept me company today.”
Ronnie Sacks stepped back, face going crimson, gobbling back a useless denial.
I replaced my hat and closed the door.
As the cab pulled away, I saw movement in the windows of House Avalante. A door opened, and a tall figure clad in black emerged to stand in the deep shadows of the wide front porch.
Ronnie watched me go. He knew they’d seen, knew they’d watched me waiting on the bench all afternoon. He didn’t look happy. I guessed he’d have some explaining to do, to those who perhaps lacked both mercy and shame.
I grinned and hummed and admired my face in the glass all the way home.
Chapter Six
The weeds and cracked bricks of Cambrit were quite a letdown after the quiet lanes and stately manors of the Hill. I arrived home well before Curfew, impressed my driver with a tip, and heard Darla’s laughter from behind Mama’s door before I reached my own.
I paused, smiled and adjusted my hat before knocking.
“Who’s there?” shouted Mama.
“The Regent sends his greetings, Madam Hog,” I intoned, in my best Lord of the Realm baritone. “Would you perhaps grant us an audience?”
Mama opened her door.
Darla stood beside Mama. Her eyes went wide. I doffed my new hat, made a bow that made my back pop.
“My lady.”
Darla stepped outside, extended her hand. I took it. Her eyes twinkled in the dying sun.
“Damn, boy,” said Mama, trundling out beside Darla. “What happened? You rob a haberdasher?”
I sighed. Darla laughed again. The spell was broken, and my feet began to ache.
“Not exactly.” Darla let go of my hand. “I’m glad you came to see me. But it’s late. You’ll never get home before Curfew.”
“Maybe I won’t go home at all,” she replied. She stepped so close I could smell bubble bath in her hair. “Maybe I’ll stay.” She let a pause linger. “With Mother Hog, of course.”
Mama snorted. “Don’t do that to him no more. Look at them ears. He’s about to blow a seam.”
Darla winked. “Hooga has the night off. He’s bringing his wagon around to collect me shortly. I’ll wrap myself up in a blanket and even the Watch will think I’m Hooga’s wife or his daughter.” She slipped her arm through mine, turned us toward my office, said goodbye to Mama Hog.
I walked.
“Come now, Markhat,” she said, as we neared my door. “You’ve kept me waiting all day. The least you can do is offer me a chair and some company.”
I fumbled for my key. The wind rustled her skirts, and she reached into my bag and pulled out last year’s grey hat.
“This one suits you better.” I turned the key as she took my new hat from my head, replaced it with the grey one, and eyed me critically. “The black makes you look like an undertaker.” She put the black hat on her own head, adopted a somber expression. “See?”
Mama Hog laughed and slammed her door. I opened mine, ushered Darla in, winced when the slanting light streaming past cast the breadcrumbs on my desk into sudden high relief.
Darla swept past, still wearing my black hat. She spun once, taking in my office, swirling her skirt up nearly to her knees.
I closed the door. “I see I need to fire another butler. Looks like Earles left me a mess.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Darla. “It’s not so bad.” She hung my black hat carefully up on my leaning coat rack, and then nodded toward the door at the back of my office. “Is that where you sleep?”
I put down my bag, hung up my coat and put the grey hat next to the black. “When I sleep, that’s where I sleep.”
“I see.” She gave me a grin. “Time for the tour later.” Then she looked down and past me, toward the floor next to the door I’d just closed. “What’s that?”
I turned. An envelope lay on the floor, after having been pushed beneath it from the street. I hadn’t seen it when we’d entered.
I stooped and picked it up. The envelope was brilliant white, more like cloth than paper, and it bore my name and address in a tall plain hand.
Darla glided to stand beside me. She touched the paper gently, made an
“My, what fancy friends you have, Mister Markhat. Aren’t you going to open it?”
She was so close we touched, at hips and shoulders, and again I smelled her hair. Which is probably why I opened the envelope without first letting Mama wave her bones over it to see if the paper was hexed.
It wasn’t. Inside was a single page of fine white paper, folded twice. I could see words on it, not hex signs, so I unfolded it.
Darla stepped suddenly away. “It isn’t polite to read someone else’s mail.” She pulled back my client’s chair and sat. “I’ll wait here until you’re done.”
The paper bore names. A dozen of them, in the same hand as the address, in a neat straight line down the page. The only one I recognized-the last-was Martha Hoobin.
Below the names were the words:
And below that were two characters I took to be initials-E.P.
Darla watched me read. I must have frowned.
“Bad news?”
I crossed to my side of the desk. Before I sat, I handed her the paper. “Probably. Do you know any of these names? Aside from Martha’s?”
She read, shook her head. “No, I don’t think so. They’re all women’s names, though, aren’t they?”
She handed me the letter, and I looked it over again. There was a Kit Ersen and a Banda Rup. Either of those could have been a man’s name or a woman’s. But all the rest were obviously female, all Usulas and Berets and Allies.
Twelve names. Twelve women, probably, with Martha Hoobin at the end of the list.
“Do you know E.P.?” asked Darla.
I shook my head. “Not at the moment,” I replied. “But I guess I will, come midnight.”
The humor went out of Darla’s eyes. “There’s only one kind of person who makes appointments after Curfew. They’re fond of expensive stationery too.”
I folded the list. “Not necessarily. Anyway, trouble usually just shows up. It doesn’t make
