Cold Copper Tears Part 9

There was a chance our dead madmen had originated in one of those three areas. I'd be hard put to decide which was the craziest.

I said, "Whoever sent those guys might be wondering what happened to them. I'm going back where Pokey got it and see if anybody turns up."

Maya thought that was a good idea. Morley shrugged. "I've had a long day. I'm going to get some sleep. I'd be interested in hearing if you find something, Garrett. Want to head back, Shote?"

The ratman grunted.

I had a thought. That happens. So do lunar eclipses. "Wait up. I want you to look at something. Everybody." I took out my coin card. "s.h.i.+ne the light on this, Maya."

"Temple coinage," Morley said. "Can't tell what temple."

Maya and Shote couldn't tell me anything, either.

Morley asked, "It have anything to do with this?"

"No. These have to do with who sicced s...o...b..ll on me. Whoever hired him paid him in these."

Morley pruned his lips. "Check the Royal a.s.say. They're supposed to keep samples of private coinages."

That was a good idea. I wished I'd thought of it. I thanked him and said good night.

19.

Maya and I had a quiet walk back. Maybe she was as worn out as I was. I didn't try to make conversation.

I tried to stay alert. It was late for chukos but I was crossing town with the war chief of the Doom, showing her colors, asking for trouble if she was spotted.

Trouble didn't find us. We saw mostly ratpeople sweeping streets, clearing trash, scrounging, stealing whatever wasn't nailed down. I have to admit they contribute, mainly by doing work no one else wants. They are industrious.

I went back to the steps where Maya and I had been sitting when Jill brought the bad news. The moon had moved along. The place was no longer in the light. Jill's building was. I watched.

Maya helped. She seemed disinclined to head for her lair. After a while, she said, "The Vampires were really trying to kill you?"

"Sure seemed like it." I shrugged. "Doesn't matter now."

"Huh? That s...o...b..ll is crazy. He'll try again."

Was she kidding? "No he won't. He really is dead, Maya."

The look she gave me.

After that we didn't talk much.

I ran out of patience. Weariness will do that. "I'm going over there. See what happened while we were roaming."

Maya followed me. She moved like she was worn out. At eighteen? After only these few hours? h.e.l.l, I was the old-timer here.

We had no trouble getting in the street door, same as before. That implied the place had heavyweight protection, something to check on, though it would lead back to Chodo if the women were what I thought. If the place was his and he found out who sent those men, somebody was in for hard times. Chodo's enforcers go after their jobs with the gusto and arrogance of tax collectors. They don't stop coming and they don't leave you anywhere to hide.

The place was quiet. The keepers had gone home to less winsome company. The kept were asleep, visions of presents prancing in their pretty heads.

We went up slowly, carefully. Earlier there had been lamps to light the way, but now they were dark. I figured the caretaker had extinguished them but I wasn't going to dance into an ambush because it seemed unlikely.

We reached Jill's door. I listened. Nothing. I pushed the door. It swung inward, as it should, quietly. I stuck my head inside.

All but two lamps had burned out, and those wouldn't be with us long. I saw no evidence that we weren't alone. "See if you can find some oil." While she looked I checked the corpses. They hadn't walked away.

I came back to find Maya filling lamps. "Long as we're here I'm going to toss the place. Those guys were looking for something and they didn't find it."

"How do you figure?" She got a couple of refills burning.

"They didn't have anything when we found them. And we accounted for all of them. So whatever it was it's here or wasn't here to begin with." I thought. I hoped.

"Oh."

"I'll do this room first so we can get the lights out. Keep an eye on the street. Anyone comes, holler."

I ripped the room apart. Jill would be p.i.s.sed if she found out. I wouldn't tell her. Let her think the bad boys did it.

I demolished furnis.h.i.+ngs. I looked for secret hiding places. I didn't find doodly squat. And Maya didn't see anything in the street.

"Darken the room so n.o.body will see the lights and wonder. Stay back a few feet so the moonlight doesn't hit your face." I recalled the face she'd seen in the window of a supposedly empty apartment. Maybe we'd take a look in there, too.

"All right."

"Getting tired?" She sounded it.

"Yes."

"I'll hurry."

"If you're going to do it, do it right. I'll stay awake."

I hoped so. I didn't need a surprise like the one Pokey got.

I did the walk-in next. All I found out was that Jill couldn't get rid of anything. There are two kinds-sentimentalists who keep everything for what it meant, and the ex-poor, who keep everything as a hedge against revenant poverty. I pegged Jill for the latter.

I hit the kitchen next. All I learned there was that Jill didn't eat at home. In fact, as I went along, despite the heap of stuff in the walk-in, I began to suspect that Jill didn't really live there, but just kept stuff there and met someone there.

I stalled doing the bedroom until I'd drawn blanks everywhere else. I didn't want to keep climbing over Pokey, reminded that life is chancy for guys like us. It might be enough to rattle me into getting a job.

I didn't like it but I went at it, doing a fast round first, in case something turned up the easy way.

It didn't. I hadn't counted on it, anyway. The only thing that comes easy is trouble.

I went after it the hard way.

Still nothing.

Well, Jill hadn't struck me as stupid. She'd had plenty of storm warnings.

I wondered if she'd carried whatever it was over to my place. I hadn't watched her pack. Sure she had, if it had been here and was portable.

Had I just wasted a couple of hours I could have spent sleeping?

I made only one find of more than pa.s.sing interest.

A small chest of drawers stood beside the bed. It was an expensive piece. The top drawer was just two inches deep. Jill had used it to dump small change. There had to be a pound of copper in there. Junk money to her, probably, though there were characters on the street who would take her head off for less.

I sat on the bed, pulled the drawer into my lap, and stirred its contents. The coins weren't all copper. Maybe one in twenty was a silver tenth mark.

The mix was eclectic, new and old, royal and private, as you'd expect of general change. Should I let Maya know the rainbow ended here?

Whoa! A perfect, mint-condition brother of the copper coin on the card in my pocket. A gem of the minter's art. I fished it out.

It meant nothing, of course...

"Garrett!" Maya called.

I shoved the drawer into the chest and headed for the front room. "What you got?"

"Take a look."

I looked. Six men moved around the street below, furtive, studiously ignoring the building while they talked.

Maya asked, "How do we get out?"

"We don't. Keep watching. I'll be across the hall. Let me know when they come inside." I got a lamp, scurried across the hall, knelt, and got to work with a skinny knife.

I had the door open when Maya arrived. "Four are coming in."

I doused the lamp and moved forward into darkness, a.s.suming the layout to reflect that of Jill's apartment, going slowly so I wouldn't get bushwhacked by rogue furniture.

I'd gone about eight feet when somebody knocked me a.s.s over appet.i.te. I never saw him, just heard his feet and Maya's squeak as he pushed past her. I fought off a man-eating chair with fourteen arms and legs. "Close the door. Quietly."

She did. "What do we do now?"

"Sit tight and hope they don't break in here. You carrying?"

"My knife."

They always have that. For chukos the knife is who they are. Without it they're just civilians.

"You get a look at that guy?"

"Not really. He was bald. He was carrying something. A corner of it hit me in the t.i.t. I thought I'd scream."

"Don't talk like that."

"What'd I say?"

"You know...Ss.h.!.+" They were in the hall. They were trying to be quiet but had invaded unfamiliar territory in the dark.

Maya whispered, "He had a funny nose, too."

"Funny how?"

"Big and bent. Like it was broken or something."

"Sshh."

We waited. After a while I sent Maya to watch from the window, in case they left without us hearing them. I got into ambush near the door in case they decided to drop in. I wondered what had become of the guy who had run out. If he'd been one of them we'd have had company by now. And if he'd run into them there would have been some kind of uproar.

It was a long wait. The sky had begun to show some color when Maya said, "They're leaving."

I went and watched. The two biggest men each carried one of the lighter corpses. The other two carried the heavier corpse. The whole bunch got out of there fast.

I figured the smart thing would be to follow their example. So of course I took my dead lamp across the hall to see if I couldn't get it lit.

I was so long Maya was in a panic when I got back. "They cleaned the place up so it looks like nothing happened."

"Why would they do that?"

"You tell me and we'll both know."

"You going to follow those guys?"

"No."

"But-"

"There are six of them and one of me and they're going to be looking for trouble. They're real nervous right now, I guarantee you. I've been there. If they've got the sense the G.o.ds gave a duck they'll get rid of those bodies fast, then scatter. And anyway, I'm so tired I couldn't not walk into something. The best thing we can do is get some sleep."

"You're just going to drop it?" There was a peculiar edge to her voice.

"What's it matter to you?"

"How am I going to learn?"

"You don't have an audience here, Maya." That proved how tired I was.

She took it like a slap in the face. She didn't have anything to say after that.