Taltos (Lives of the Mayfair Witches #3)(53)
Author: Anne Rice

The woman in the room behind him tugged at the knobs of the doors, then flung them open. Ash stepped to the side.

“Aaron Lightner’s dead!” she cried. “Aaron’s been murdered.”

There were gasps, small cries of dismay and surprise. But all around, there was innocence. The old man from the library looked mortally wounded by this news. Innocent.

It was time to get away.

Ash pushed through the loose gathering quickly and decisively and made for the stairs, going down two by two before anyone followed. The woman screamed for them to stop him, to not let him escape. But he had too good a head start, and his legs were so much longer than theirs.

He reached the side exit before his pursuers found the top of the little stairway.

He went out into the night and walked fast across the wet grass, and then, glancing back, began to run. He ran until he had reached the iron fence, which he easily vaulted, and then he walked up to his car and made a hasty gesture for his driver to open the door for him and then take off out of here.

He sat back as the car moved faster and faster on the open highway.

He read the fax number written by the woman on a piece of paper. It was a number outside of England, and if memory served him right, it was in Amsterdam.

He pulled loose the phone hooked beside him on the wall of the car, and he punched in the number for the long-distance operator.

Yes, Amsterdam.

He memorized the number, or tried to, at least, and then he folded the paper and put it into his pocket.

When he returned to the hotel, he wrote down the fax number, ordered supper, then bathed at once, and watched patiently as the hotel waiters laid out for him a large meal on a linen-draped table. His assistants, including the pretty young Leslie, stood anxiously by.

“You’re to find me another place of residence as soon as it’s daybreak,” he told Leslie. “A hotel as fine as this one, but something much larger. I need an office and several lines. Come back for me only when everything is arranged.”

The young Leslie seemed overjoyed to be so commissioned and empowered, and off she went with the others in tow. He dismissed the waiters, and began to consume the meal of sumptuous pasta in cream sauce, lots of cold milk, and the meat of a lobster, which he did not like, but which was, nevertheless, white.

Afterwards he lay on the sofa, quietly listening to the crackling of the fire and hoping perhaps for a gentle rainfall.

He also hoped that Yuri would return. It wasn’t likely. But he had insisted they remain here at Claridge’s on the chance that Yuri would trust them again.

At last Samuel came in, so drunk that he staggered. His tweed jacket was slung over his shoulder, and his white shirt was rumpled. Only now did Ash see that the shirt was specially made, as the suit had been, to fit Samuel’s grotesque body.

Samuel lay down by the fire, awkward as a whale. Ash got up, gathered some soft pillows from the couch, and put them beneath Samuel’s head. The dwarf opened his eyes, wider than usual, it seemed. His breath was fragrant from drink. His breath came in snorts, but none of this repelled Ash, who had always loved Samuel.

On the contrary, he might have argued to anyone in the world that Samuel had a rocklike, carven beauty, but what would have been the use?

“Did you find Yuri?” Samuel asked.

“No,” said Ash, who remained down on one knee, so that he could speak to Samuel almost in a whisper. “I didn’t look for him, Samuel. Where would I begin in all of London?”

“Aye, there is no beginning and no end,” said Samuel with a deep and forlorn sigh. “I looked wherever I went. Pub to pub to pub. I fear he’ll try to go back. They’ll try to kill him.”

“He has many allies now,” said Ash. “And one of his enemies is dead. The entire Order has been alerted. This must be good for Yuri. I have killed their Superior General.”

“Why in the name of God did you do that?” Samuel forced himself up on his elbow and struggled to gain an upright position, but Ash had finally to help him.

Samuel sat there with his knees bent, scowling at Ash.

“Well, I did it because the man was corrupt and a liar. There cannot be corruption in the Talamasca that isn’t dangerous. And he knew what I was. He believed me to be Lasher. He pleaded the Elders as his cause when I threatened his life. No loyal member would have mentioned the Elders to anyone outside, or said things that were so defensive and obvious.”

“And you killed him.”

“With my hands, the way I always do. It was quick. He didn’t suffer much, and I saw many others. None of them knew what I was. So what can one say? The corruption is near the top, perhaps at the very top, and has not by any means penetrated to the rank and file. If it has, it has penetrated in some confused form. They do not know a Taltos when they see one, even when given ample opportunity to study the specimen.”

“Specimen,” said Samuel. “I want to go back to the glen.”

“Don’t you want to help me, so that the glen remains safe, so that your revolting little friends can dance and play the pipes, and kill unsuspecting humans and boil the fat from their bones in cauldrons?”

“You have a cruel tongue.”

“Do I? Perhaps so.”

“What will we do now?”

“I don’t know the next step. If Yuri hasn’t returned by morning, I suppose that we should leave here.”

“But I like Claridge’s,” Samuel grumbled. He keeled over, eyes closing the moment he hit the pillow.

“Samuel, refresh my memory,” Ash said.

“About what?”

“What is a syllogism?”

Samuel laughed. “Refresh your memory? You never knew what a syllogism was. What do you know about philosophy?”

“Too much,” said Ash. He tried to remember it himself. All men are beasts. Beasts are savage. Therefore all men are savage.

He went into the bedroom and lay down on the bed. For one moment, he saw again the pretty-haired witch, Yuri’s beloved. He imagined that her naked br**sts were pressed gently against his face, and that her hair covered them both like a great mantle.

Then he was fast asleep. He dreamed he was walking through the doll museum in his building. The marble tile had just been polished, and he could see all the many colors, and how colors changed depending upon what color was right beside them. All the dolls in their glass cases began to sing—the modern, the antique, the grotesque, the beautiful. The French dolls danced, and swung their little bell-shaped dresses as they did so, their round little faces full of glee, and the magnificent Bru dolls, his queens, his most treasured queens, sang high soprano, their paperweight eyes glistening in the fluorescent lights. Never had he heard such music. He was so happy.