The translator stared at him, thunderstruck, and Ralke stifled a grin.
CHAPTER 5
You did not tell me your man spoke my language,” the translator said slowly, “but he is mistaken. Why would I lie?”
Gar started to answer, Because you enjoy making trouble, but Ralke forestalled him. “You would lie because the boss will leave it to you to draw the money from the treasury and bring it to me. You’ll give me what I think the boss agreed upon and keep the rest for yourself.”
The look the translator gave him was pure hatred.
The boss said something, and the translator turned to answer.
“The boss wants to know what you’re talking about,” Gar murmured, “and the translator is telling him he can’t repeat it, because what you’re saying is so insulting.”
“None of that!” Ralke said sharply. He turned and bowed to the boss and his wife again. “Tell them I have only the highest respect for them, and was only discussing how many marks there are to a silver pound.”
The translator flashed him a glare that should have shriveled him, but turned back to interpret. “He told the boss what you really said this time,” Gar said.
“Fortune favored me when you joined our caravan, Gar Pike!” Ralke forced a smile for the translator. “It seems you and I shall do business of our own, interpreter. I’m Ralke; who are you?”
“My name is only for my friends,” the interpreter snapped, but the boss cleared his throat with impatience, and the translator gave him a guilty glance as he added, “and for my business associates. I am Torgi.” He turned to the boss and gave a brief explanation.
“He’s just telling them that you’re trying to be friendly by exchanging names with him,” Gar muttered. “He’s giving them your name, too.”
“As though they didn’t have it already,” Ralke returned.
Torgi turned back to them. “What do you suggest?”
“That you interpret my prices accurately,” Ralke told him, “but I’ll raise them by one part in five. Then after the sale, you and I will split that one part, half each.”
“One part in ten is better than nothing,” Torgi grumbled.
“Much better than your boss learning how you were garbling his words,” Gar reminded.
Torgi’s glare would have seen him convicted for poisoning on a civilized world, but he could only say, “I agree to your terms. Now, how much do you want for the dye?”
“I had hoped for three silver marks and a copper mark,” Ralke sighed, “but the boss’s offer will give me some profit, at least.”
Torgi turned and translated faithfully. The boss smiled and glanced at his wife, who beamed up at him and nodded. He turned back to speak in a lofty but kindly tone.
“He will give you the copper mark for each pound,” Torgi translated, “but trusts you will be as moderate as you may in your other prices.”
“The boss is very gracious,” Ralke said, with a smile and a little bow at the couple.
The bargaining proceeded smoothly from that point, and when they were done, Ralke was looking quite satisfied, because the boss and his wife had bought half his stock and had paid him a fair price. The boss said something with a smile, and Torgi told Ralke, “His Honor has enjoyed dealing with you, and trusts you will visit his castle on your next journey.”
“I will be honored by his hospitality,” Ralke said, with yet another bow.
Torgi translated; the boss smiled benignly, satisfied, but told Torgi one more thing as he turned away. Torgi said a few words and bowed.
“He told Torgi to get the money and pay us,” Gar muttered.
“I will fetch the money,” Torgi told them. “Then you will be on your way quickly, yes?”
“We’ll pack while you’re gone,” Ralke assured him.
“You will go, too.” Torgi gave Gar a look that promised revenge. “We shall meet again, be sure.”
“I’ll look forward to it,” Gar said, in a tone of great politeness.
“Brandy,” Cort told the serving wench. “The whole bottle.”
She smiled knowingly and turned away. “Rough day, huh?” Dirk said, with a sympathetic look.
“Oh, the day was fine,” Cort told him. “It’s the night that’s been an ordeal.”
“Girl trouble, eh?”
Cort looked up, amazed.
“It couldn’t have been that little dust-up back in the alley,” Dirk explained. “Compared to battle, that was a piece of cake. So if you’re on leave, it had to be a woman.”
“You’re shrewd, stranger,” Cort said slowly, “and you know the ways of soldiers. How long have you been a mercenary?”
“All totaled? Maybe a year.” Dirk smiled at Cort’s skeptical look and explained, “I’m a free lance. I sign up for bodyguard jobs as often as army, and the captains usually hire me for just one battle.”
“Can’t be signing on as an officer, then,” Cort said, frowning. “A captain wouldn’t want a stranger in his cadre.”
“Right on the mark. I’m a sergeant.”
“Only if you sign up with a mercenary company,” Cort said with a smile. “Sign up with a boss around here and you’re a brute.”
“That your term for a noncom?”
“Their term,” Cort corrected. “Mercenaries use the old words—old enough that we don’t know where they came from. But we have to know the others. After all, any of us might want to join a boss someday.” He saddened suddenly, thinking of Squire Ellsworth—and, therefore, of Violet.
“So a sergeant is a brute,” Dirk said briskly. “Might be apt, at that. What’s a lieutenant?”
“A bruiser,” Cort explained, “and with the bosses, he rides a horse and wears heavy armor. Mercenaries have whole companies of cavalry, lightly armed, and they can dance circles around the bruisers while they cut them to shreds.”
“I take it a bully is a captain?”
“Yes, and the boss is a general. Sometimes the boss will appoint one bully to command the others, but that’s the only case where there’s a rank in between.”
“Other countries, other ways.” Dirk sighed. “At least it’s no worse than trying to understand navy ranks and insignia.”
The bottle landed on the table, then two mugs. It was a measure of Cort’s state of mind that he didn’t even glance at the wench, only pushed some coppers over as he told Dirk, “I’ve heard of navies—fighting sailors, aren’t they?”
“Yes, and I only served with them once. Never again! I don’t like having the ground move under me when I’m trying to thrust and parry. As soon as the ship docked, I signed off, and that’s how I came to your country.”
“The seacoast is far away,” Cort commented. “You must have been quite a time, coming this far inland.”
Dirk shrugged. “One job led to another, each farther away from salt water, which was just fine with me. I was captured in the last battle, and being a stranger just hired for the duration, the captain didn’t think I was worth ransoming. So I went to work for the boss who had caught me.”
Cort grinned slowly. “Why not? If the captain wasn’t loyal enough to ransom you, then you had no loyalty to worry you. But didn’t the boss realize you wouldn’t be any more faithful to him?”
“I don’t think bosses really worry about loyalty,” Dirk said slowly, “just about belting you if they think you’ve betrayed them. Still, the issue didn’t come up. I fought in one more of your little wars, somehow survived, and that was it. Didn’t even stay long enough to figure out that boss, bully, bruiser, brute, and boot were like rank names.”