Granny shook her head. “No. Not in broad daylight, not before he has a chance to…let us say, assert himself. We are quite safe here.”
Granny turned and started marching for home, and I followed.
“So, his real name was Gorvis.” It wasn’t a name anyone had mentioned yet. Not that I was at all convinced by Granny’s fist of rags. She could easily have staged the whole scene when she saw me coming. For what purpose, I still didn’t know.
“He’s buried not far from your house, Granny. And that’s not a name you know?”
“It isn’t.” Traffic started picking up, so Granny fired up her public spook doctor act, complete with muttering and random bursts of howled laughter.
“I’m not a big believer in coincidence, Granny.”
“Nor am I.” She replied in a whisper between rants about spying spirits and groaning ghosts.
“I’m going to go out on a limb, Granny. I’m going back to Regency Avenue, and this time I’m going to ask about a man named Gorvis. If you just staged that whole, little scene back there on the spur of the moment, tell me right now, or so help me I’ll start handing out the crowns at random, on the street.”
Granny guffawed.
“You go. You ask your questions. You get down off that roof, shade of Angus Fergis!” She said the last in a screech that caused pedestrians all around us to stop and search the rooftops for spooks.
“And when you’re done, come back. You and I will have business tonight. After Curfew. You and I and a man named Gorvis. Are you willing to do that, Mr. Markhat?”
“If that’s what it takes to earn my pay.”
“I see you, shades of the Lowrey twins! I see you peepin’ in them windows!”
Granny winked.
I said my farewells and headed back to Regency Avenue.
The first thing I did after arriving at Regency was present myself to the biggest pair of Owenstall’s bullies I could find.
They knew my name, and they knew I had the blessing of the boss himself. One of them even went so far as to suggest a place or two some of the older folks might be at the moment.
Oh, what a difference a few words from Mama had made.
I thanked them and started making my rounds. This time, I wasn’t concentrating on the name Sellway, but on Gorvis.
And I wasn’t having much better luck, either. Blank looks. Shakes of the head. Frowns and creased brows and ultimately, variations on the theme of no.
I expanded my search, no longer just talking to people of a certain age and above. I talked to kids. To their parents. To their nannies, to their grannies, to their yipping poodle-dogs.
One of Owenstall’s bullies brought me a sandwich and a glass of tea sometime well after noon. He even wished me luck.
I had the blessing of the local muscle, but none whatsoever from Lady Luck. I pondered that as I chewed. I’d seated myself on a bench under the largest of the poplars that lined the avenue. It offered scant shade, but I’d learned long ago to take whatever comfort I could get.
The sandwich, at least was good. And the tea was cold and dark.
So I was more than a little annoyed when a trio of well-dressed toughs walked up to my bench and knocked my glass of tea right out of my hand.
I swallowed and put the rest of the sandwich down, lest it too be cast into the street.
“Whoa,” I said. I did not stand. I could tell from the expression of my tea-tosser that he’d just knock me down if I did. “Look, gents, you need to check in at the head office. Owenstall himself said I could ask my questions. And this sandwich and that tea were his, by the way.”
“I don’t know any Owenstall,” snarled my new friend. He made his hands into fists. “But I do know you.”
“Are you sure? Because to know me is to love me. Trite, but true. It’s my innate charm-”
I didn’t get to finish, because I was hauled to my feet by the two silent gentlemen.
I’d assumed they belonged to Owenstall because of their dress. They weren’t common street thugs. Their shoes were shined, their shirts were pressed, their trousers actually fit and someone had ironed the wrinkles out not too long ago.
I didn’t struggle. That made the third man frown. People were beginning to stop, to stare. Some even flocked out of doors to watch the show.
I knew none of them expected that. The normal procedure in most of Rannit is to turn away from trouble, lest it come and visit you.
I grinned. I was seeing something else they weren’t-namely, a half dozen of Owenstall’s boys, who were rounding the corner and coming my way, their expressions none too happy.
“You been poking around, finder. Messing in things that ain’t your business. Maybe it’s time you was taught a lesson.”
“Maybe so,” I said amiably. “But it’s not one that’s going to be taught by you. Now here’s what’s going to happen. Your boyfriends here are going to let me go. You’re going to buy me another glass of tea. And then we’re all going to sit down and talk about who sent you, and why they sent you.”
The man cursed and drew back a fist, and I was wondering if I should have kept talking for just an instant more when Bolton himself stepped right up into my new friend’s face and slapped him, hard, right across his mouth.
The man blanched. But then Owenstall’s boys were on him, and on the two pinning my arms behind my back, and after a very brief scuffle I was free and facing tea-tosser from a very different perspective.
Bolton slapped him again, from the other side.
“You come into my neighborhood?”
Slap.
“You start shaking down people on my street?”
Slap.
“You think you can walk in here and start pushing people and nobody pushes back?”
Slap.
It took two slaps for the man’s face to go from fury to fear. He looked to his companions, but they weren’t displaying any heroics.
“You all right, Mr. Markhat?”
Slap.
“I’m peachy,” I said. “Do you know this gentleman, or his friends?”
Bolton snorted. “Sure I do. This here is Mr. Corpse. His friends are Mr. Fishbait and Mr. Hogfeed. You don’t need to worry about them bothering you again. Unless you get a line snagged on this one’s torso when you’re out fishing in the Shallows.”
All three men blanched. Bolton was convincing. Even I wasn’t sure he was bluffing.
I frowned. “I don’t know. Dismemberment seems a little harsh for the loss of a beverage. Maybe they’re willing to make amends. What about it, gentlemen? Have you seen the error of your wicked, sinful ways? Are you filled with a burning desire to rejoin polite society as helpful, productive citizens?”
Bolton grinned and produced a very long, very sharp knife. “Or would you rather be gutted and dumped in the Brown?”
There was dried blood plain in the gap between blade and hilt. It wasn’t that old.
All three men professed repentance, and we were off to Owenstall’s office.
I finished my sandwich on the way.
The three men who’d accosted me and abused my tea were named Argis, Florint and Wert. Wert was the leader.
And Wert was a very nervous man. It was cool in Owenstall’s well-appointed office. But from the amount of sweat pouring off Wert, you’d have thought he stood on a sunlit gallows, and in a way I suppose, he did just that. I almost felt sorry for the man.
Even seated like civilized beings in Owenstall’s luxurious office, it was clear that Bolton and his well-used knife were not just possible outcomes but probable ones.
