But, back to business. “How did the modeling go?” he asked.
“Not as embarrassing as I had feared-and actually they paid me a trifle more for it than I had expected.”
“That’s good. But I suppose you’ve seen nothing of what I wanted you to look for?”
“Nothing, I am sorry to say.”
“And you go back there tomorrow?”
“That’s right. He says he’ll want me for several days yet at least. It’s the master himself I’m posing for.”
“De Borron, then. Good. What kind of tools is he using to work the stone?”
She blinked at him solemnly as if she understood this question must be important but could not think why. “A hammer and a chisel. Several different chisels actually. Nothing like the special item that you described to me.”
“All right. And you haven’t mentioned that special item to anyone else-hey?”
“Not at all. Of course not. You told me not to.” Natalia’s new low-cut upper garment showed a lot of pale skin below the former neckline of the old peasant blouse. Her hair was now worn in a new style too, Kasimir realized vaguely, though it still looked like strings of dishwater.
He asked her: “Who else is present in the studio?”
“It’s about the same as when you were there, people coming and going. Did you want me to try to keep track of them?”
“Not necessarily. No, you’d better just concentrate on the important thing.”
Their conversation about conditions in the Red Temple meandered along, pausing when a stooped old priest in white robes moved close past them on his way to light a candle at the altar.
Kasimir was coming slowly to the realization that he found himself attracted to this woman. Somewhere in his mind, not very far below the surface, he resented the idea of the sculptor and all those red-robes staring at her body. The truth was that he wanted to stare at it himself.
But the purpose of this meeting of course was business. Instead of inviting Natalia to his room, he asked her if she would like something to eat or drink. As before, she accepted, and they moved to a nearby tavern where they enjoyed some food and drink. He also passed over the coins due her for her day’s observations and report.
Telling himself it was his duty to become better acquainted with his agent, he justified somewhat prolonging the meeting; and the truth was that they each enjoyed the other’s company. They exchanged some opinions upon art, and medicine, and life.
But soon Natalia was growing restless; she had other things to do, she said, and didn’t volunteer any hint of what they were. Kasimir didn’t volunteer any questions. Instead he went back to the inn alone.
It was near dusk when he arrived again at the sign of the Refreshed Travelers, and he felt somewhat tired. It had been a long and busy day, beginning with his and Wen Chang’s visit to the Blue Temple in the morning.
But the long day was not over yet.
As soon as he entered the stable below their rooms, he discovered Lieutenant Komi and his men, fully armed and mobilized. Wen Chang was there too and they were waiting for Kasimir, in fact almost on the point of mounting up and leaving without him. Komi and his men looked ready and willing to say the least; the days of boredom were evidently beginning to tell on them.
Wen Chang said: “Word has just come from Captain Almagro. He has located one of the men who was in the fight yesterday, in which our foreman Kovil was killed. The man we want is hidden in an infamous den of thieves, and Almagro would like our help in digging him out.”
The clouds of sleep were cleared in a moment from Kasimir’s brain. “Then I am ready!”
CHAPTER 10
IN a city with a population the size of Eylau’s there would always be large numbers of folk awake and wanting light, and the city would never know total darkness as long as lamps and torches could be made to burn. But night was on the way to enfolding Eylau as completely as it ever did before Wen Chang and Kasimir were ready to mount their riding-beasts. As soon as they were mounted, and Lieutenant Komi and his troop of Firozpur soldiers were in the saddle behind them, their small force set out from the inn. The soldiers’ uniforms and some of their weapons were effectively concealed under their desert capes.
Riding close beside Wen Chang at the head of the little column was a sergeant of the city Watch. This was the man who had been sent by Captain Almagro, to inform Almagro’s partners that he was about to launch the raid, to request their help, and to guide them to the site as quickly as possible.
Kasimir, riding just behind Wen Chang and their guide, was wide awake now, not tired at all; the excitement of the chase was growing in him. So far their mounts were able to maintain a rapid pace; at this hour the darkened streets of the city held comparatively few people, and those who found themselves in the way of the silent, businesslike procession quickly moved aside.
Streets in the vicinity of the Inn of the Refreshed Travelers were comparatively broad. But it soon became apparent that their guide was leading them into a very different portion of the city. As they approached the district where the raid was to take place, the streets grew narrower and their windings even more convoluted.
This gradual constriction continued for some minutes, during which time the party, now often riding in single file, made the best speed possible. Then their guide signaled them for even slower movement, and less noise.
They had now come in sight of distant lamps, sparkling on a broad expanse of water. Kasimir realized that they were now once more near the bank of the Tungri, which here as elsewhere in the city was lined with docks and warehouses. He had no way to tell how far this site might be from the place where the bodies had been found. Boats bearing lights were passing in the night. Though the sea was thousands of kilometers distant, the river here evidently bore a great volume of local freight and passenger traffic.
In this section of the metropolis the residential area closest to the docks and warehouses was obviously a slum. On both sides of the street, tenements leaned against each other. Few lights showed in these close-packed, ramshackle buildings. The torches carried by a couple of the Firozpur troopers made a moving island of light in the narrow, dusty street.
In this neighborhood the people who appeared in the street were losers, the Emperor’s children if Kasimir had ever seen the type. These slum-dwellers were quicker than people in other neighborhoods had been to scramble out of the way of the advancing column. Anonymous voices hidden on roofs and in windows above called out oaths and comments against the mounted men below, whom they took for a patrol of the Watch.
Presently the sergeant who was riding beside Wen
Chang pulled his mount to a halt. Close ahead, two figures, one of them carrying a small torch, had just emerged from the mouth of a dark alley. In a moment Kasimir was able to recognize the man holding the torch as Captain Almagro.
The Captain came forward on foot and greeted his two chief colleagues eagerly but quietly as they swung down out of their saddles. Then he led them just inside the mouth of the alley, where he introduced them to his companion, a middle-aged man who tonight would be nameless in the line of duty, a wizard in the employ of the Watch.
“Before we discuss anything else,” the Magistrate murmured to his old friend, “tell me whether you have managed to take care of the items I requested at our last meeting.”
“I have set things in motion,” said Almagro. “That is all I have been able to do so far.”
“Then that is all that I can ask.”
Next the Captain conducted a low-voiced briefing for the new arrivals, on the subject of the coming action.
The building he meant to raid had been abandoned as a warehouse several years ago, and was now notorious as a den of thieves and cutthroats. On looking out of the mouth of the alley where they now stood they could see it, just visible at the end of the street, less than a hundred meters away. The old warehouse was four or five stories high-depending on how you counted certain irregular additions-and contained perhaps as many as a hundred rooms. Almagro’s basic plan was to break into the place through several entrances at the same time.
The Captain had assembled a dozen of his own men here in the alley, and with the reinforcements provided by the Firozpur he planned on being able to conduct the raid with overwhelming force. An attack on such a scale would surprise whatever criminals were in the building, and with any luck at all none of them would be able to get away.