Bitter Gold Hearts

"I'm desperate, Mr. Garrett. My world is falling into ruin around me and I seem to be incapable of halting the decay. I have come to my last resort—no. That's getting ahead of myself."

I told my face it was supposed to look enrapt with anything she might say.

"I have spent my entire adult life in the Stormwarden's employ, Mr. Garrett. Beginning before her father died. It's seldom been pleasant. There have been no holidays. The rewards have been questionable, perhaps. By being privy to inside information, I've managed to amass a small personal fortune, perhaps ten thousand marks. And I've developed an image of myself as a virtual partner in the Stormwarden's enterprises, able to be trusted with anything and capable of carrying any task through to the desired conclusion. In that spirit I've done things I wouldn't admit to my confessor, but with pride that I could be trusted to get them done and trusted not to talk about them later. Do you understand?"

I nodded. No point slowing her down.

"So a few months ago she was called to the Cantard because the course of the war seemed to be swinging our way and it was time to put on all the pressure we could. She left me to manage the household, as she has done a dozen times, and especially charged me with riding herd on her family, all of whom had been showing an increas­ing tendency toward getting involved in scandals."

"The two Karls, you mean? They're the ones the ru­mor mill loved. I never heard of the daughter till the other day."

"She was blind, the Stormwarden. Those girls were the ones who were deserving. Though Amber had begun to show signs of getting wild, just for the attention."

I nodded as my contribution.

She took a deep breath. "Since she's been gone this time, it's been like I've been under a curse. Father and son were determined to circumvent me at every turn. Then that kidnapping business had to come. I had to deplete the family treasury severely, selling silver at a discount, to get that much gold together. It was a disas ter, but for a cause the Stormwarden could respect once her temper cooled. I might even have survived Amiranda's having taken flight during the confusion. The girl was restless for some time before she took off. The Storm-warden herself had remarked that it was coming. But putting out two hundred thousand marks gold to ran­som Karl, only to have him take his own life, that's insupportable."

Was I supposed to know about Junior or not? Instinct told me to play it cautious. "Did you say that Karl killed himself?"

"This morning. He slashed his wrists and bled to death in a hole of a room in Fishwife's Close."

"Why the hell would he do that?"

"I don't know, Mr. Garrett. And to be perfectly frank, at this point I can't much care. He destroyed me by doing it. Maybe that was his motive. He was a strange boy and he hated me. But Karl isn't the reason I came here. I'm doomed when the Stormwarden returns, which she will very shortly. However, my pride—badly mauled but not yet dead—insists I go on, trying to salvage what I can on her behalf. Amber fled the house this morning. This is where you come in."

I told my face to look interested.

"Amiranda and Amber are at large and therefore at risk. If I can salvage that much for the Stormwarden, I will. I'm going to try. I have gone into my own funds to do so. I want you to find those girls. If you can."

She plomped a sack down in front of me.

"One hundred marks gold, to retain you. I'll pay a fee of one thousand marks gold each if you can return either of those girls before the Stormwarden comes home."

"Your man Slauce can't handle—"

"Courter Slauce is an incompetent imbecile. This morn­ing I sent him after Amber. He turned up just before I left to come here, too drunk to recall where he'd been or what he'd been doing. I console myself with the certainty that he'll starve to death after the Stormwarden chucks the lot of us into the street. Will you look for my missing girls, Mr. Garrett?"

"Give me a few minutes to think." I had to smooth out some dents in my ethics and reach an accommodation with my conscience. I considered myself to be working for three clients already: myself, Saucer head, and Am- her. Though Amber wasn't getting the first-class produc­tion. And nobody was paying me. Willa Dount would be paying, though she wouldn't be getting her money's worth. Still, an experiment had oc­curred to me.

"Suppose I had a notion where I could find one of the girls right now?"

"Do you?"

"Take it as a supposition. How can I be certain I'd get my fee?"

She levered herself out of her chair, straining like a woman decades older. "I came prepared for that possibil­ity." What might have been a smile tickled the corner of her mouth. She started digging sacks out of her clothing. In a minute there was a line of ten before me, each a twin of the one offered me as a retainer. I checked the contents of one at random.