Grantville Gazette 37

and land, and their children after them, it would be worth it. She happened to glance out the window above the sink, to see what the day's weather looked like. Some of the maize stalks were moving. But there was no wind, at this early hour. 'Tim! Jack! Someone is picking in our field!'

****

Tim belted on his sword, but in his hands he carried a hunting rifle. Jack took a double-barreled shotgun from the closet beside the back door. The disturbance, they saw, was over toward the Wall, as close to it as they'd dared plant. They separated, to catch the intruder between them.

A popinjay in a lavender coat was scrabbling about in their garden, blundering into the plants and breaking some, picking up bits of something from the ground. A couple of times he looked up sharply at the cliff.

It was no trouble at all for Tim to walk up to within ten feet of the man and point his rifle an inch to one side. 'You want to die, bastard?'

The man looked up at Tim and raised his hands in surrender.

'George Bennet. I never thought I would see you again this side of the Styx. What a pity.' He gestured with his rifle to move him along to the front porch, Jack walking on the other side. 'What mischief are you making here on my property?'

Bennet began a confused muttering of Ring's Fire, and from where it had fallen. It all began to come together in Morton's mind.

'Deborah, sweetheart, here's the one the police want so much. After you send for them, tell Villareal to come with his gear, too, will you? I believe there will be climbing to do today. Bess, there you are, kindly run and tell Master Oughtred the same.'

Bennet suddenly seemed to focus. 'Villareal? What is this? You are the Earl of Arundel's man, as I am. Where is your loyalty?'

'Loyalty? Loyalty? If you've done half of what I think, you've blackened the earl's name from here to Constantinople. Piss-poor loyalty that was! My loyalty is to this state where I took an oath of citizenship, and to my family here, and all the people who've treated me fair since I came. Jack and I did our job for Arundel, we got Master Oughtred here safe and sound, and the only thing I owe the old man now is the tavern gossip he pays me for. Loyalty!' He spit on the ground over the porch rail and moved his head fractionally toward the telephone. Deborah was already dialing.

****

Marvin Tipton was back on when the dispatcher hollered that Tim and Jack Morton had one of the arson suspects under citizen's arrest for, of all things, trespassing in a cornfield. The chief himself responded over the radio; he wanted to question this bum right away. Looked like Juergen Neubert's guess last night was right on the money. The longer ol' Juergen was on the job, the better he got. Marvin decided he'd better go out in the field and direct from there today, as soon as he could work up the search plan and get the teams on their way. Now, where were those jaegers and their dogs?

****

Leanna came running in from the bedroom. 'Dad! Wake up! It's the Mortons on the phone. They think they know where Mom is. They want you out there with climbing gear, and anybody else you can round up.'

Carlos levered himself off the camp mattress in the den, picked up the phone there, listened, organized priorities in his head. Leanna was already packing a lunch for him, and her husband Enrico had coffee brewing and his thermos on the kitchen counter ready to fill; Carlos didn't have to think about any of that.

First get some more help up and moving, then pull on yesterday's clothes and go. All his stuff was still in the truck from the other day. Too bad Sherrilyn Maddox wasn't in town, she was as good a rock climber as he'd ever met. The Fire Department high angle team, then. He called fire headquarters, gave them the what and where.

Leanna squeezed his arm as he ran out the door. Paola just looked at him wide-eyed.

****

When Carlos got to the Morton house, they had the creep in the purple coat leashed by his ankles to the porch post. They were watching him like a couple of guard dogs anyway.

Bennet was hollering, 'What is the meaning of this, Morton? I am of the Earl of Arundel's companions. I have rights!'

Carlos blew his stack. He took the stairs in one stride, grabbed Bennet by his coat, and slammed him against the post. 'You've got a right to keep silent and a right to a lawyer, you piece of shit, but I'm not a cop. Where's my wife?'

'I've seen you, you're no more than a tavern keeper. You dare lay hands on me?'

'I'm the guy who'll break your damn neck if you don't give me a straight answer. What'd you do to my wife?'

****

Fifty yards down the slope at the Mortons' parking turnout, Press Richards heard a roar that could lift a manhole cover. Oh, boy, that's Villareal. He slammed the cruiser's door and took off up the front walkway at a run. He wasn't worried Carlos would kill the guy, but he was a cop, and he had two priorities right then. First, get Olivia back safely, if at all possible. Second, make sure the charges stuck. Nobody was going to abuse a prisoner on his watch, and Villareal was big enough to do some serious damage without even intending to. The idea of playing a Pat-and-Mike routine with a civilian never even crossed his mind. He chose his words as he came within sight of the porch.

'Back off, Carlos. You don't want to give this guy's lawyer any ammunition.' He pointed his finger at the perp in the purple coat. That long, curling blond hair he had was something else. 'You're under arrest.' He cuffed the prisoner, and rattled off his rights. 'Morton, Oughtred, what can you tell me?'

Villareal suddenly went around behind purple-coat and grabbed his left wrist, turning the hand over.

'Hey, I told you to stand back.'

'Look at this silver ring on his finger, Chief. It's Olivia's. I made it.' Villareal let go.

Richards, Villareal and Morton all looked at each other. Tim Morton began to recount what he'd seen and heard. After a while the prisoner began to babble something about the goddess Calypso, above all earthly things. The geologist, Oughtred, agreed with Morton's thinking. She was likely up on the Wall someplace, and there was only one place up there they knew of that made any sense. That rope hanging there pretty well clinched it. The rescue truck was already pulling up; four of the Benedictine Brothers in fire department uniform got out and started up the front walk. Briefing time.

****

'Sounds like a plan, Brother Girard. Let's get out of here, before the road is full of buses.'

'As soon as you can shift your equipment into our truck. And you can just call me Girard, while we're on fire department business.'

'Fine, I'm Carlos and this is Will.' He reached down and helped Will pick up his climbing gear off the porch. Moving his own was just a matter of snatching a few old milk crates out of the back of his pickup and passing them across.

The last thing he saw before they closed the doors and rolled away was Tim's stepdaughter Bess Lacey at the corner of the porch, patiently searching all around the Wall with Will's big tripod telescope.

There wasn't much to say, on the ride up to Schwarzburg. With two extra people sitting on top of the rock climbing equipment, it was cramped enough in back. Will was refreshing his memory of a few details from the little notebook he'd found on the grass by his path the previous day-no idea how it had gotten lost there. Their seatmates were praying silently.

The little dirt parking spot at the north end of the upper village was as far as they could take the rescue truck. From there, it was half a mile along a pack trail, then a rough path up-slope to the clifftop above the cave. Carlos looked around at everything they were unloading for the job. 'Three trips to carry this stuff up, you think? What goes first?'

Brother Girard smiled. 'Look behind you, Carlos. I made certain arrangements through fire headquarters while we drove up.'

Carlos turned and looked up the road-several soldiers were bringing horses down from the castle.

The Morton family's side porch

Jack stood looking at the Wall. Nobody was talking to him just now; Father had gone off to guide the jaegers and their hounds while they worked through their land. Beside him, stepsister