But that didn’t prove the existence of this Jenger. It wouldn’t prove there had been any message sent by the abbot or received by him or by some other person in the abbot’s stead. Unless, that is, the abbot or that other person kept the messages he received, in either case in their personal quarters. There would be some difficulty searching there! Though there might be copies in the mining tower itself of messages sent and either copies or the originals of messages received! Now would be an excellent time to explore that possibility, for the Dragdown Swamps still covered the slopes westward and it was unlikely there was anyone there to take notice.
What a pity the writer of this message had not taken time to search for messages or to say that he had done so and there were none. Though if there had been none in the tower at the time of the rescue, it meant nothing. Pigeons might have arrived there after the rescue. Besides, the writer of this note had been preoccupied. He said the girl was rescued, but he didn’t say what condition she was in, injured perhaps, perhaps . . . sexually attacked. Wordswell’s face showed a moment’s fury before he purposefully smoothed it. He liked Xulai! If someone had abused her, Wordswell hoped fervently that person was dead.
He found a particular book of maps. They had been drawn years before, when the mining of the western and northern slopes of this massive highland had been at its height. He noted the round red circles that denoted towers, the spots that indicated communication-flag poles, the round black circles that meant shaft entries, the dotted lines that meant underground tunnels, layers of them shown in different colored inks, one atop another. At the top of the slope there were three red circles. One, far south, was merely a ruin. It had been undermined and collapsed a lifetime ago. Wordswell had seen it. Another stood farther north. If the duchess were indeed involved in this abduction, the chances were that she or her agent would have used the middle tower, the one closest to the abbey. Less than a day’s ride away. The one around on the northern slope was closer to Benjobz.
There might be a chance of finding evidence of the duchess’s complicity, though after Xulai’s brief dissertation on the career of Queen Mirami, evidence against the duchess seemed unlikely. The woman was old in villainy, well schooled, no doubt. If all that Xulai had said was true, Queen Mirami and her daughter, perhaps Prince Rancitor, also, and the Duke of Kamfels, were of a measure far beyond Wordswell’s power to comprehend. They frightened him.
Then there was the matter of Xulai herself. Her people were grieving, the old woman most seriously. She had not been at meals recently, though of course, the others may have taken her food. He decided to make a quick call upon her, which he did, taking the message.
He found Oldwife Gancer much worse than he had feared: pallid, weak, so deeply troubled as to be incapable of caring for herself. He told the women, Precious Wind and Nettie Lean, that he had a message for her to be delivered privately, and they agreed, reluctantly, to leave him alone with her.
“Oldwife Gancer,” he said. “I have a message from Xulai.”
“Who’re you?” she grated.
“Someone Xulai trusted,” he said. “Someone who could receive messages without other people knowing. Can you read, lady?”
“Of course I can read,” she said. “All us folk at Woldsgard were schooled!”
“The message is delicate, be careful with it, don’t tear it.”
She took it in her cupped hand, drawing herself up in surprise, her eyes alight. “Why, it’s one of those pigeon things! Duke Justinian was always sending off those things. Many’s the times I’ve sat in the loft with him and Xulai watching those birds . . .”
She took it from his hand and unrolled it carefully with trembling hands, turning it until it was right-side up. “This isn’t Xulai’s writing.”
“It’s Abasio’s writing,” he said. “The dyer. The man with the wagon.”
She was still reading, her mouth falling open. “Bear? Bear did that? Oh, why would, why . . . he was like a . . . like an uncle to her, or a big brother would have been. Why would he . . .”
“Money most likely,” said Precious Wind from the door. Her voice was bitter. “Sorry to listen, Elder Brother, but I was worried for Oldwife.”
He gestured for her to enter and shut the door behind her. “This message is secret. You must not tell anyone here about it.” He handed the message to Precious Wind. “You see what it says about the abbot.”
Oldwife cried, “That nice old man! He sent such a sweet message telling us to keep up our spirits. Why would he . . .”
Precious Wind looked up from the fragile paper, her face quite still. “I don’t imagine Elder Brother has any certain whys yet, Oldwife, or any certain whos, either. He looks to me like a troubled man who has just learned something that’s upsetting him a good deal. Why would that be, sir?”
He grimaced. “Not having known this was going on, of course. Not knowing for sure even now. And not knowing what to do. Each of us elder brothers and sisters has some departments or offices that we control as far as manpower and material allocations go. The bird loft is one of mine, ostensibly. Actually Brother Winger runs it very cleanly and simply, and I seldom have reason to question anything he does. Now he tells me he’s known of this correspondence for some years! Though he works hard at giving the impression of an unschooled and ignorant man, I have had my doubts about that. I’ve suspected for years he reads everything, but he’s never said a word about it until now. I find what he tells me more troubling than I can say. From what Xulai told us about the duchess, she is a
