A Snoop Without Magic, page 12
“Oh. I think they were on the other side. Northeast. I didn’t consult with a map.”
Sam was in no shape to go look for them, and it would have been obviously imprudent to look for him, not after stirring the hive like they had.
“Eat.”
The woman’s breakfast was even better than the ones Ommie had cooked on the road.
When Sam was done, the woman helped Sam back to her bed.
“I shouldn’t take up your bed.”
“Nonsense. I can sleep at my son’s house. I do it often enough, so I can watch my grandchildren get up in the morning.” She smiled at the thought.
She worked in her kitchen for a bit more and gathered some things.
“My son found your horse. It is tied up outside and has been fed. You can leave whenever you wish.” She eyed the crossbow. “Has that ever killed a person?”
“Not to my knowledge,” Sam said. The bolts that Sam made did the killing.
“I doubt if you can keep that from happening,” she sighed. “I’ve left some food, and you can take the blanket on your bed. It is a spare. Say hello to Harrison Dimple for me. My name is Neeta.”
“Neeta? Is that all?”
“I never gave anyone in the army any other,” she said. “I wish you well. You seem to be a nice boy. Try to stay nice.”
Sam smiled. “I will do my best.”
She waved to him as she slipped out the door. “I have no doubt you will. Leave as soon as you can. It will be better for both of us.”
Sam laid back and closed his eyes. He would take a quick nap and then he would have to head north.
He woke an hour later, feeling much better. The wind howled outside, swirling the snow. Sam shook his head. He guessed the son hadn’t quite reached his limit of tolerance. Sam wouldn’t impose any more than he already had.
He had lost Emmy, Winnie, Faddon, and Harrison, and now he’d have to find them.
Chapter Fourteen
~
H e took what the woman had offered him. Sam had taken a small purse with him on his rescue mission and left a silver fox on the table for the woman. He wrapped the blanket around him and made a pollen mantle. At least it would shed the snow for a while.
The food went in his saddlebags with the crossbow tied to one of them. He found the faint glow of the sun and headed along the track that led north. The snow finally let up, but the wind pierced his pollen mantle. He was tempted to increase the thickness of the mantle, but he had come nowhere close enough to regain his strength. The track intersected a larger road that led northeast. Sam took it. His hopes of intercepting Harrison were getting dimmer and dimmer.
He kept heading east along the road. There was no sign of a large party of riders along the way. Sam finally reached a good-sized village. The name didn’t register with him, but he made it off the horse at the stable yard and paid for a room before staggering upstairs and collapsing on the bed.
Sam blinked himself awake. Someone shined a lantern close to his face.
“You are alive, aren’t you?”
Sam nodded. He felt alive, especially since his shoulder reminded him that he could still feel pain. “I am.”
“Just checking. You were out of it when you arrived earlier, and my wife wouldn’t let me sleep until I checked on you. Your room was unlocked, and I expected to find a corpse.”
“I will make it to tomorrow,” Sam said.
“Lock your door behind me, so I won’t worry.”
Sam managed a smile and made it to his feet, to the door, before he staggered back to the bed.
He woke up the next morning feeling better. His shoulder ached, but it felt like it was mending. At least his armor had kept the arrow from doing any damage to bones and ligaments, as he moved the joint gingerly.
After a stretching session, Sam descended the stairs.
“I see you made it,” the innkeeper said.
Sam smiled. “I appreciate your concern.”
“My wife’s,” the innkeeper said.
“He isn’t married,” one of the early morning customers said, laughing.
The innkeeper growled.
“I still appreciate your concern,” Sam said.
“At least you are well-mannered. Where are you from?”
“I spent the last month in Gruellia,” Sam said. “I was doing field work for the University of Tolloy. I got lost and rode into a broken branch. I found a healer to sew me up, but he didn’t want to have me around his clinic, so I rode east until I ended up here. I must admit I’m not in very good shape, since I had thought I was better.”
“No, you aren’t. Why don’t you stay here for a few days? The weather is about to turn, so your journey will be easier.”
Sam sighed. Harrison and Bentwick were long gone. He nodded. “I’ll do that. I’m useless to anyone right now.” As he said it, Sam knew it for the absolute truth. He had a fair breakfast that didn’t compare to Neeta’s meal and retreated back up to his room where he spent the rest of the day, descending for meals and washing up.
The next morning, Sam undid his bandage. The woman had used pollen stitches that had disintegrated during the night, but Sam’s recuperative powers had beaten the stitches as usual. Sam took that for a good sign. He still was weaker than he should have been, but he didn’t think he would be spending the day in bed.
He was eating a quiet breakfast when some people came rushing into the inn, clamoring for the innkeeper. Sam looked up to see a village crisis unfold in front of his eyes.
“The mayor has just hanged himself,” the innkeeper said to Sam. “Some people are calling it suicide, and some are calling it murder, and the village constable hasn’t returned from visiting his mother.” He sat down opposite Sam and rubbed his sparsely thatched skull. “We don’t know what to do.”
Sam pursed his lips. “I used to be a snoop, working at the Baskin Constabulary, but I left them to pursue my education. I’ll help you as much as I can.”
“You look a little young for a snoop.”
Sam pulled out his worn constabulary token. “Here, look at this.”
The man took the token and examined it front and back. “That is genuine. It is even nicer looking than Mel’s. When can you start?”
“As soon as I finish my breakfast. Is there someone who can vouch for me?”
The innkeeper brought over a middle-aged woman.
“This is Stella. She is on the village council.”
The innkeeper had the woman sit down, while Sam gave the woman a very condensed version of what he had done.
“You are in the midst of an education?”
Sam nodded.
She shrugged. “Well, no one in this village knows the first or second thing about investigating a suicide. Let’s go!”
Sam followed the woman outside after retrieving his blanket.
“You need a proper coat,” she said.
“I know. Is there a store in the village?”
Stella grinned. “I run the general store. I can find something that will fit, for sure,” she said. “This way, and then we will get you fitted for a more comfortable traveling experience.”
Sam smiled back.
They entered a large cottage. People were milling about, looking in the windows and muttering in the cold.
In the middle of the room, the mayor hung like a side of beef. The man was large, that was for sure.
Sam got up on a chair and examined the noose and the rope before having other council members help him get the body down to the floor and placed it on a pollen tarp that one of them made on the spot.
“Does the village have a healer?” Sam asked.
“Your friend who runs the inn would have had our healer looking at you when you arrived. No, the healer left for greener pastures a few years ago. We haven’t enticed another one to live with us, although there are a few who have enquired about the job. You aren’t a healer, too, are you?”
“I know the rudiments,” Sam said, looking at the body on the floor. He checked the man’s head, finding a lump. It was a blow to the head and hard enough to break the skin. The man might have been murdered. “Let us talk about the mayor,” Sam said. “Did he have any enemies?”
“Everyone,” Stella said. “The man made his living giving out loans.”
“Is that how he got to be mayor?”
“No,” one of the men said. “He also is half-noble.”
“What does that do?” Sam asked.
“Haven’t you heard of the new law? Anyone with noble blood can run any village or town if they get an appointment from the Court of Nobles in Baskin. All we can do is sit on the council, while he,” the man pointed to the body with his chin, “can lord it over us, and he did.”
“I have been out of Toraltia doing research. When was this law put into effect?”
“In the middle of the fall, I think,” Stella said. “Do you think this was murder?”
Sam looked at the rope that killed the man. “Maybe. It isn’t particularly unusual for a murderer to try to make his or her act look like someone else did it, including suicide.”
The council members looked at each other.
“What did the mayor do for a living?” Sam asked.
All three of them looked at each other, then at Sam. “He foreclosed on things.”
“Foreclosed as in takes possession of whatever people can’t pay off?”
“That’s it. He has a building in the back. Do you want to see it?”
Sam nodded. “Let’s go.” He took the pollen rope with him. Stella had the man’s keys. They unlocked the warehouse. There were all kinds of things inside, and nothing appeared to have been stolen. Sam looked around and spotted a section where the mayor had tied things to a beam.
“This is his, too?”
“Of course,” one of the councilors said.
Sam stepped up on a chest of drawers and untied a chair. He handed the chair to one of the councilors. “You want a chair?” the man asked.
“No, I want to see the rope. Is this something the mayor would make?”
“He made it, all right. He would never buy a real rope to save his life,” Stella said. “I know.”
Sam casually looked at the two ropes. They were quite different. One was tan with reddish streaks, while the noose was tied using a darker brown rope with green streaks. He strolled around the warehouse noticing more uses of rope, and everything was tan with red streaks.
“Definitely a murder,” he said. He looked at the three councilors. “I’ll show you a snoop technique. Not many people know it. I want each of you to make a length of rope about three feet long. As thick as this.” He held up the mayor’s rope.
They quickly made rope, laughing at the exercise.
One councilor’s rope matched the noose.
“You are the killer,” Sam said to the councilor.
The man’s face lost all its color. He took a deep breath and sat down. “How did you find out?” He didn’t even try to deny it.
“Everyone makes pollen differently. If you look at the ropes the mayor made, they all looked like this. The rope used to hang the mayor matches yours.”
“Perfectly,” Stella said. She looked at Sam with appraising eyes. “You really are a snoop.”
“I said I was. This was a crime of opportunity. How did the mayor lose consciousness?”
“I hit him over the head with his fire poker,” Stella said, shocking Sam.
“We all lifted him up to hang him from the beam,” the other councilor said.
All three of them were in on it. Sam shook his head.
“What did he do to you?”
“To the village?” Stella said. “He bled us dry. When his certificate arrived from Baskin, he became mayor, and his rates tripled. There was nothing we could do. With the new law, we had no recourse.”
“I’m not an official snoop at present. I can see your point. Tell me your stories again, and let me document the mayor’s actions,” Sam said. He could see the councilors looking at each other. “Not the murder. I’ll sign a paper saying that I thought it was suicide. In a sense, it was suicide by greed.”
The councilors exhaled, nearly as one.
“I was hoping you would see it that way.”
“I don’t condone your actions, don’t misunderstand,” Sam said. “But I won’t do anything about it.”
Sam did have a desire to leave the village alive. If they killed the mayor, they could easily justify killing him. He figured he might have saved the absent constable’s life, too.
~
Sam made some final notes. The three councilors had asked him to report what he wrote down, and Sam agreed to the meeting. He had spent another two days interviewing nearly everyone in the village. The council was right; the mayor was universally reviled.
“Is there anyone else in the village with noble blood?” Sam asked.
“No,” Stella said. “What did you find out?”
“I suppose you know. I have listened to lots of anecdotes, but I was particularly interested in how people felt about the government in Baskin.”
The councilors all had sour looks on their faces.
“Vacuous snits,” one of the men said. “Because they are born noble and can speak their secret language, they are better than the rest of us. The mayor couldn’t speak a word of court language.”
“I am quite fluent, but I’m no lord.”
“You are?”
“University of Tolloy,” Sam said. “I could be a clerk somewhere eking out a wage with a degree.” He smiled.
“Someone ought to do something about it.”
“What if someone did?” Sam asked.
“Harrison Dimple,” Stella said as if his name would solve all the world’s problems. “He’s our only hope. He’s noble, but he is supposed to think like a commoner. He pretended to be a healer for years.”
“He didn’t pretend,” Sam said. “He has healed me before. I grew up in Cherryton where Harrison lived.”
“You know him well enough to call him by his first name? He let you?”
“He called me by my first name,” Sam said. “Why is he your only hope?”
“The best hope to save Toraltia from running with blood. He is respected by both sides.”
“Not the nobles,” Sam said.
“That isn’t what I meant,” Stella said. “He is respected by the common people, even though he is a noble. We can accept him, but no other.”
“How strongly do you believe that?” Sam asked.
“We would fight for him. No one wants to live with a gem-encrusted slipper on their neck,” Stella said. “We’ve already had enough of that.”
The other councilors agreed.
“If I find Harrison, I will tell him that. He might need your help.”
“He will find he has a whole country behind him.”
“That isn’t true,” Sam said. “There are those who make a good living by following the Court of Nobles’ orders. Your mayor did. I suppose there are a lot of interests in Toraltia who don’t feel the way you do, but I suspect the majority of Toraltia is with you.”
“Most,” one of the councilors said.
Sam didn’t know. Neeta and her son had differing opinions, but if Harrison could harness the power of the people, he stood a chance. Knowing Harrison, the healer would have known that for some time. His old mentor made part of his living extracting information from the common people with a friendly smile and a demeanor that made people feel they could trust him. He hadn’t seen a different Harrison during the winter.
“I think I might go find him,” Sam said. “But first I’ll need to write out a report for the constable and get some supplies for my search.” He smiled at Stella. He wouldn’t sign his name to the report, of course, but at least the councilors would have a consistent story.
“You write your report and then come over to my store.”
Chapter Fifteen
~
S am decided he wouldn’t take a chance finding Harrison in Baskin, so he decided to go to the second-most hostile city to him in Toraltia. He wondered how his father was faring, and Addy. He found he cared less about his mother, for which he felt bad, and cared nothing about what Mark was up to.
He sounded out every village and town that he passed through and found, not to his surprise, that most citizens agreed with Stella and the rest of her council. Finally, Cherryton was the next town. Sam had continued to let his beard grow. He hadn’t shaved since Gruellia, and his beard, although not thick, did a good job of covering his face. Sometimes when he looked at the mirror in a room, he barely recognized himself.
He entered Cherryton opposite where his father had his smithy. He expected people to notice him, but few bothered to look. The day was about to end, and people scurried here and there. It had been five years, and Sam had stopped growing. He was man-sized, at least in length.
He stopped at the baker’s shop, disappointed to find a different baker arranging the bread.
“Tom Washjoy used to have this bakery the last time I rode through,” Sam said, ordering some pastries.
“The Washjoys were run out of town by the new lord two years ago. Everyone had had enough of their strange ideas,” the baker said. “I thought they were nice people, though.”
“Where did they go?”
“No one knows. I heard they changed their names and hid their religion.”
What a pity, Sam thought. It seemed that Cherryton wasn’t any more tolerant of them, as it turned out, than they were of him.
He munched on a pastry as he rode past the school. Batchelor Bank, the schoolmaster who had cast him out, was out scolding students in the schoolyard. Everything brought back memories. Cherryton was still Cherryton, but Sam could feel the change in atmosphere. He didn’t know if it was his imagination, but the city seemed wound tight.
He passed the post office and thought he might have spotted Wally Scrivener walking out with a bag slung over his shoulder. Sam had hoped he could become a deliveryman, but his prospects had changed before he left Cherryton. The town seemed smaller than it had before, but then Sam was bigger, and he had traveled the world, thanks to Harrison Dimple and Lady Keeta Grate.
