Nightside the Long Sun

Silk leaned back against the wall. “It wasn’t terribly obscure. If the Civil Guard had been notified, as I suppose it should have been, I’m certain they would have understood what happened at once. It took me a minute or two, but then I know very little about such things.”

Her eyes blazed. “She did it herself! You saw it. She stabbed herself.” Chenille gestured toward her own waist.

“I saw her hand on the hilt of your dagger, certainly. Did you put it there? Or was it only that she was trying to pull it out when she died?”

“You can’t prove anything!”

Silk sighed. “Please don’t be foolish. How old are you? Honestly now.”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“Nothing, I suppose. It’s only that you make me feel very old and wise, just as the children at our palaestra do. You’re not much older than some of them, I believe.”

For several seconds Chenille gnawed her lip. At last she said, “Nineteen. That’s the lily word, too, or anyhow I think it is. As well as I can figure, I’m about nineteen. I’m older than a lot of the girls here.”

“I’m twenty-three,” Silk told her. “By the way, may I ask you to call me Patera? It will help me to remember who I am. What I am, if you prefer.”

Chenille shook her head. “You think I’m some cank chit you can get to suck any pap you want to, don’t you? Well, listen, I know a lot you never even dream about. I didn’t stick Orpine. By Sphigx, I didn’t! And you can’t prove I did, either. What’re you after, anyhow?”

“Fundamentally I’m after you. I want to help you, if I can. All the gods—the Outsider knows that someone should have, long ago.”

“Some help!”

Silk raised his shoulders and let them drop. “Little help so far, indeed; but we’ve hardly begun. You say that you know much more than I. Can you read?”

Chenille shook her head, her lips tight.

“You see, although you know a great deal that I do not—I’m not denying that at all—what it comes down to is that we know different things. You are wise enough to swear falsely by Sphigx, for example; you know that nothing will happen to you if you do that, and I’m beginning to feel it’s something I should learn, too. Yesterday morning I wouldn’t have dared to do it. Indeed, I would hardly dare now.”

“I wasn’t lying!”

“Of course you were.” Silk laid Blood’s stick across his knees and studied the lioness’s head for a moment. “You said that I couldn’t prove what I say. In one sense, you’re quite correct. I couldn’t prove my accusation in a court of law, assuming that you were a woman of wealth and position. You’re not, but then I have no intention of making my case in any such court. I could convict you to Orchid or Blood easily, however. I’d add that you’ve admitted your guilt to me, as in fact you have now. Orchid would have the bald man who seems to live here beat you, I suppose, and force you to leave. I won’t try to guess what Blood might do. Nothing, perhaps.”

The raspberry-haired girl, still seated on the bed, would not meet his eyes.

“I could convince the Civil Guard, also, if I had to. It would be easy, Chenille, because no one cares about you. Very likely no one ever has, and that’s why you’re here now, living as you do in this house.”

“I’m here because the money’s good,” she said.

“It wouldn’t be. Not any longer. The big, bald man—I never learned his name—would knock out a tooth or two, I imagine. What Musk might do if Blood allowed him a free hand I prefer not to speculate on. I don’t like him, and it may be that I’m prejudiced. You know him much better, I’m sure.”

The girl on the bed made a slight, almost inaudible sound.

“You don’t cry easily, do you?”

She shook her head.

“I do.” Silk smiled and shrugged again. “Another of my all too numerous faults. I’ve been close to tears since I first set foot in this place, and the pain in my ankle is no help, I’m afraid. Will you excuse me?”

He pushed down his black stocking and took off Crane’s wrapping. It was warm still to his touch, but he lashed the floor with it and replaced it. “Shall I explain to you what happened, or would you prefer to tell me?”

“I’m not going to tell you anything.”

“I hope to change your mind about that. It’s necessary that you tell me a great deal, eventually.” Silk paused to collect his thoughts. “Very well, then. This unhappy house has been plagued by a certain devil. We’ll call her that for the present at least, though I believe that I could name her. As I understand it, several people have been possessed at one time or another. Did they all live here, by the way? Or were patrons involved as well? Nobody’s talked about that, if some were.”

“Only girls.”

“I see. What about Orchid? Has she been possessed? She didn’t mention it.”

Chenille shook her head again.

“Orpine? Was she one of them?”

There was no reply. Silk asked again, with slightly more emphasis, “Orpine?”

The door opened, and Crane looked in. “There you are! They said you were still around somewhere. How’s your ankle?”

“Quite painful,” Silk told him. “The wrapping you lent me helped a great deal at first, but—”