“Wait!” he called.
The floater turned almost upon its side as they rounded a corner, losing so much height that its cowling plowed the dust.
“That might be a—whatever the trouble is.” Silk was holding on desperately with both hands, pain and the damage the white-headed one had done to his arm forgotten. “Go back and let me out.”
Wagons blocked the street. The floater slowed, then forced its way between the wall of a tailor shop and a pair of plunging horses.
“Patera, they can take care of it. It’s happened there before, like I told you.”
Silk began, “I’m supposed—”
The driver cut him off. “You got a real bad leg and a bad arm. Besides, what if somebody saw you going in there—a place like that—at night? Tomorrow afternoon will be bad enough.”
Silk released the leather-covered bar. “Did you really float away so quickly out concern for my reputation? I find that difficult to believe.”
“I’m not going to go back there, Patera,” the driver said stubbornly, “and I don’t think you could walk back if you tried. Which way from here? To get to your manteion, I mean.” The floater slowed, hovered.
This was Sun Street; it could not have been half an hour since they had floated past the talus and out Blood’s gate. Silk tried to fix the Guard post and soiled statue of Councillor Tarsier in his memory. “Left,” he said absently. And then, “I should have Horn—he’s quite artistic—and some of the older students paint the front of our manteion. No, the palaestra first, then the manteion.”
“What’s that, Patera?”
“I’m afraid I was talking to myself, my son.” They had almost certainly been painted originally; it might even be possible to find a record of the original designs among the clutter of papers in the attic of the manse. If money could be found for paint and brushes as well—
“Is it far, Patera?”
“Another six blocks perhaps.”
He would be getting out in a moment. When he had left Blood’s reception hall, he had imagined that the night was already gray with the coming of shadeup. Imagination was no longer required; the night was virtually over, and he had not been to bed. He would be getting out of the floater soon—perhaps he should have napped upon this soft seat after all, when he had the opportunity. Perhaps there was time for two or three hours sleep in the manse, though no more than two or three hours.
A man hauling bricks in a handcart shouted something at them and fell to his knees, but whatever he had shouted could not be heard. It reminded Silk that he had promised to bless the driver when they parted. Should he leave this walking stick in the floater? It was Blood’s stick, after all. Blood had intended for him to keep it, but did he want to keep anything that belonged to Blood? Yes, the manteion, but only because the manteion was really his, not Blood’s, no matter what the law, or even the Chapter, might say. Patera Pike had owned the manteion, morally at least, and Patera Pike had left him in charge of it, had made him responsible for it until he, too, died.
The floater was slowing again as the driver studied the buildings they passed.
Silk decided that he would keep the manteion and the stick, too—at least until he got the manteion back. “Up there, driver, with the shingled roof. See it?” He gripped the stick and made sure its tip would not slide on the floor of the floater; it was almost time to go.
The floater hovered, “Here, Patera?”
“No. One, two, three doors farther.”
“Are you the augur everybody’s talking about, Patera? The one that got enlightened? That’s what somebody told me back at the estate.”
Silk nodded. “I suppose so, unless there were two of us.”
“You’re going to bring back the calde—that’s what they say. I didn’t want to ask you about it, you know? I hoped it would sort of come up by itself. Are you?”
“Am I going to restore the calde? Is that what you’re asking? No, that wasn’t in my instructions at all.”
“Instructions from a god.” The floater settled to the roadway and its canopy parted and slid into its sides.
Silk struggled to his feet. “Yes.”
The driver got out, to open the door for him. “I never thought there were any gods, Patera. Not really.”
“They believe in you, however.” Aided by the driver, Silk stepped painfully onto the first worn shiprock step in front of the street entrance to the manteion. He was home. “You believe in devils, it seems, but you do not believe in the immortal gods. That’s very foolish, my son. Indeed, it is the height of folly.”
Suddenly the driver was on his knees. Leaning on his stick, Silk pronounced the shortest blessing in common use and traced the sign of addition over the driver’s head.
The driver rose. “I could help you, Patera. You’ve got a—a house or something here, don’t you? I could give you a hand that far.”
“I’ll be all right,” Silk told him. “You had better go back and get to bed.”
Courteously, the driver waited for Silk to leave before restarting his blowers. Silk found that his injured leg was stiff as he limped to the narrow garden gate and let himself in, locking the gate behind him. By the time he reached the arbor, he was wondering whether it had not been foolish to refuse the driver’s offer of help. He wanted very badly to rest, to rest for only a minute or so, on one of the cozy benches beneath the vines, where he had sat almost every day to talk with Maytera Marble.
Hunger urged him forward; food and sleep were so near. Blood, he thought, might have shown him better hospitality by giving him something to eat. A strong drink was not the best welcome to offer a man with an empty stomach.
