just as much as we do.”
“I noticed,” Bembo said dryly. “A lot of Forthwegians do, don’t they?”
“Keep moving, there,” Pesaro said. He was puffing and sweating himself; he’d done more marching since coming to Forthweg than in all the years since he’d made sergeant and comfortably ensconced himself behind the station-house desk back in Tricarico. But he kept on putting one big foot in front of the other, steady as a stream, inevitable as an avalanche. As for Bembo, he wanted a breather. Pesaro didn’t give him one.
It was most of an hour later when Oraste pointed ahead and said, “There. That must be the place. Miserable-looking little dump, isn’t it? How many are we supposed to take out of it, Sergeant?”
“Twenty.” Pesaro grunted. “Hardly looks like it’s got twenty people in it, does it, let alone twenty Kaunians? But if we don’t bring back twenty, we get blamed.” He kicked a clod of dirt. “Life’s not fair.”
“Sergeant?” That was a youngish constable named Almonio. Bembo looked at him in some surprise; he hardly ever said anything.
“What is it?” Pesaro sounded surprised, too.
“Sergeant...” Now that he had spoken, Almonio looked as if he wished he hadn’t. He marched along for several paces before going on, “When we get into this Hwinca place, Sergeant, may I have your leave not to help round up these Kaunians?”
“What’s this?” Sergeant Pesaro studied him as if he were a double rainbow or a golden unicorn or some other astonishing freak of nature. Pesaro’s beefy face clouded. “You telling me you haven’t got the stomach for it?”
Miserably, Almonio nodded. “Aye, I think that’s what it is. I know what’s going to happen to the whoresons once we take ‘em, and I don’t much want to be a part of it.”
Bembo’s eyes got wider and wider as he listened. “Powers above,” he whispered to Oraste, “the sergeant’ll tear him limb from limb.”
“Aye, so he will.” Oraste sounded as if he was looking forward to it.
Pesaro, though, seemed more curious than furious. “Suppose we’re rounding up the blonds and they try and fight us? What are you going to do then, Almonio? You going to stand there and let the Kaunians kill your comrades?”
“Of course not, Sergeant,” Almonio answered. “I just don’t want to have to. drag them out of their houses, that’s all. It’s a filthy business.”
“War is a filthy business,” Pesaro said, but he still didn’t sound angry. He rubbed his chins as he thought. At last, he pointed toward the reluctant constable. “All right, Almonio, here’s what you’ll do for today: you’ll stand guard while the rest of us winkle out the Kaunians. If they give any trouble--if they even look like they might give any trouble--you start blazing. Have you got that?”
“Aye, Sergeant.” Almonio stopped marching for a moment so he could bow. “I thank you, Sergeant.”
“Don’t thank me too much,” Pesaro answered. “And, by the powers above, keep your cursed mouth shut, or we’re both in hot water.” He shook his head. “Warm water would feel good right now, but not that hot.”
Into Hwinca marched the constabulary squad. The village was smaller and dingier than Oyngestun; it didn’t lie on a ley line, and so seemed more a product of a distant time than Oyngestun had. And Oyngestun, as far as Bembo was concerned, hadn’t been anything to write home about, either.
He didn’t write home very often, anyhow. He’d quarreled endlessly with his father before going out on his own; they still had little to do with each other. His sister had quarreled with the old man, too. But Lanfusa’s escape had been to marry a furrier who was now on his way to being rich. She didn’t like being reminded her brother was only a constable. If he sent a letter to Safta, she might write back. She was likelier to fall over dead from shock, though.
A few Forthwegians nodded to the constables. One of them grinned and winked and clapped his hands, almost as if he were an Algarvian. The leer on his face made Bembo remember that what he was doing in Forthweg probably ought not to go down in writing to anyone.
