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“I didn’t intend to get into this,” Loris protested. His craggy face was grim.
“You introduced the subject yourself when you referred to yours as the legitimate government, Councillor. I was about to say that though you searched for the adopted son Calde Tussah had named as his successor, as your duty required, you did not hold elections for new councillors, as your Charter demands. My ally Calde Silk governs because the people of your city wish it, and so his claim is better than yours. Aid given by a friendiy power is not an act of war. How could it be? Are you saying that we of Trivigaunte attacked your city? It welcomed us with a parade.”
Silk waited for a response; when none came, he said, “You have already heard that I know the contents of your previous calde’s will. I found a copy in your Jurgado. Let me say, too, that in my opinion the adopted son you searched for with so much diligence did not exist. Calde Tussah invented this son to draw your attention from an other child, an illegitimate child who may or may not have been born before his death. If she had already been born, referring to an adopted son was doubly misleading, as he doubtless intended it to be.” Silk sipped his tea. “Don’t go, Chenille.”
Potto sprang to his feet. “You!”
“Did you kill my father, Councillor?” Chenille’s dark eyes flashed. “The real one? I don’t know, but I don’t think it was really Councillor Lemur. I think it was you!”
Oosik raised his slug gun, telling Potto to sit down.
“If you did and evidence can be found,” Silk continued, “you will have to stand trial. So far we have none.”
“Are you Silk or Siyuf?” Potto demanded.
“Silk at present. I’ll resume the game in a moment. Your Cognizance, will you speak? I ask it as a favor.” Upon Silk’s shoulder, Oreb fluttered uneasily.
“If you want me to, Patera Calde.” Quetzal’s glittering gaze was fixed on Potto. “Not many of us knew Tussah. Patera Remora did, and Loris. Did you, Generalissimo?”
Oosik shook his head. “Twenty years ago I was a captain. I saw him several times, but I doubt that he knew my name.”
“He knew mine, eh?” Remora cleared his throat. “I had, er, was coadjutor in those — um — happier days. Ah — mother still living, eh, General? It, um, sufficient in itself, hey? Though there were other favorable circumstances.”
Chenille, who had stopped pouring tea, murmured, “I wish I knew more about him.”
“I, um, disliked him, I confess,” Remora told her. “Not hatred, you understand. And there were times, eh? But I was, er, substantially alone in it. Wrong, too, eh? Wrong. I, um, concede it now. Loud, brawling, vigorous, and I was — um — determined, quite determined secretly, to be offended. But he, er, put the city first. Always did, and I — ah — accorded insufficient weight to it.”
“He wouldn’t flatter my then coadjutor, Patera Calde,” Quetzal explained. “He flattered me, however. He flattered me by confiding in me. He never married. Are you both aware of that?”
Silk and Chenille nodded.
“Clergy take a vow of chastity. Even with its support, chastity is too severe for many. He confided to me, as one friend to another, that his housekeeper was his mistress.”
“Not — ah — under the Seal, eh?”
Quetzal’s hairless head swayed on its long neck. “I don’t and won’t speak of shriving, though I shrove him once or twice. This was at di
Chenille said, “If that was my mother, you didn’t.”
“I did not. I couldn’t find her. Though she was good-looking in her way, she was an ignorant woman of the servant class. I know she disliked me, and I think she was afraid of me. She was guilty of adultery weekly, and unable to imagine forgiveness for it.”
Silk said, “You searched for her as soon as you heard Calde Tussah was dead?”
“I did, Patera Calde. Not as thoroughly as I should, since she was alive and I failed to find her.”
Loris said, “I remember her now. The gardener’s wife. She oversaw the kitchen and the laundry. A virago.”
Quetzal nodded frigidly. “She was the type he admired, and he was the type she did.”
Auk began, “This gardener cully—”
“A marriage of convenience, performed by my prothonotary in five minutes. There would have been talk if Tussah had a single woman in this palace. His gardener wasn’t intelligent, though a good man and a hard worker. He was proud to be seen as married, as a man who’d won the love of an attractive woman. I imagine she dominated him completely. I thought they would look for new employment when Tussah died, and I pla
Chenille said, “We sold watercress. But if somebody wanted to give us money, we took it. I used to ask for money, too, and run errands. Do little jobs.” She swallowed. “After a while I found out there were things men would give me half a card for. It was a fortune to us, enough food for a week.” She stared at her listeners, challenging them.
Loris smiled. “Blood will tell, they say.”
“Blood won’t,” Silk declared. “Blood’s dead — I killed him. But if Blood were alive, he might tell you that it was good business to give rust, at first, to the young women at Orchid’s, and to sell it to them afterward — to keep them in constant need of money, and thus keep them there for as long as he and Orchid let them stay. The Ayuntamiento let him bring rust and other drugs into our city, in return for what I must call criminal services.”
Hyacinth said, “I use it sometimes, and I’ve been telling myself that if Chen can kick it so can I, and I hope it’s true. But it’s hard, don’t ever believe anybody who says it’s not.
Quetzal gave Loris a lipless smile. “Blood does tell, my son.” “Watch out!” Oreb advised; it was not clear to which he spoke.
Maytera Mint asked, “Do you know why they didn’t try to find another situation, Calde?”
“I don’t; but I believe I can guess. Chenille’s mother had recently given birth to the calde’s child, or if she had not, she was carrying that child — and it was her child, too. She must have guessed, or known, that the calde had been murdered. At that time, the Ayuntamiento was searching everywhere for the adopted son mentioned in the calde’s will; and she would have supposed, as I believe most people did, that it would kill him if it found him. She needn’t have been an educated woman, or an imaginative one, to guess what would happen to another child of the calde’s, if it learned that she existed.”
Silk filled his lungs, feeling a twinge from his wounded chest. “We’ve gotten far off the subject, but since we’re here, let’s finish what we’ve begun. Calde Tussah left a substantial estate. I have it now as trustee for his daughter; I’ll turn it over to Chenille as soon as she reaches twenty, the legal age of maturity.”
“Good girl!” Oreb assured everyone.
Loris told Silk, “That will have to be adjudicated by the courts, I’m afraid.”
He shook his head. “Our government is sorely in need of funds, Councillor. We have a war to prosecute, in addition to all the usual civic expenses; and we gave each of General Mint’s troopers two cards, as well as his or her weapon, before we sent them home.”
Loris said, “You’re generous with the taxpayers’ money.”
“In order to do it, we’ve taken control of the Fisc; the city assumes responsibility for inactive accounts, and for the accounts in trust, such as Calde Tussah’s. We’ve sequestered the accounts of the members of the Ayuntamiento, as you know. Do you want to talk about it now?”
Sciathan said, “We must speak more of the airship. It is urgent. This Potto says he will get it, but in one month. We have a few days at most. Not more.”