Well, let him. Harris couldn’t afford to worry about it now. He kept his aim on the building.
Noriko found a second-story window, allowing her to look into the cargo house. Immediately below her were enormous shelves piled with wooden crates and cardboard boxes. Below and to the left was the doorway into the office building; Alastair and Jean-Pierre held it, firing short bursts into the cargo house, keeping the Changeling’s men under cover. She could see Doc and Joseph, the former leaping clean through a set of shelves to open fire on defenders on the other side, the latter advancing on gunmen with a mangled metal sheet held before him as cover.
Gunfire sounded from the far side of the building. That had to be the men defending at the exterior door, in battle with Lieutenant Athelstane’s soldiers.
She squeezed through the window and, catlike, dropped to the nearly empty top of the shelving below. The impact made her bruised knee smart more. Thin board bent beneath her feet but did not give way. The shelves themselves, massive and rock-solid, stood firm against the impact.
She raced forward along the shelf-top, toward the broad center aisle between the ranks of shelving, and gauged her leap. It was fifteen feet, a distance she should easily manage—on an unimpeded dirt track, on an unhurt leg. If she failed, she’d crash into the shelves on the far side.
She picked up speed in the spare few steps before the end . . . and then she was airborne, flailing the sword in her right hand and the sheath in the left for balance. She heard the whistle of a bullet inches from her head.
Noriko came down on the far shelf-top with two feet to spare, but stumbled as her hurt knee gave way. She fell forward, slamming down on the cheap wood of the shelf, knocking the wind from her. She heard her sheath clatter to the concrete floor before she realized she’d lost it. But she was up in a second, ignoring the pain in her chest and leg, and leaped for the top of the next set of shelves over, a much shorter jump than her first one.
Two more bounds and she was at the shelf next to the side door. Below, two men with autoguns stood at the door, firing out through slits cut in the wall. Beside them, two cars, a hardtop sedan and a canvas-topped red roadster, waited—escape vehicles for the Changeling’s men. She saw no one through their windows; they hadn’t yet decided to retreat.
She stepped off the top of the shelf and dropped more than a dozen feet, landing on her back on the canvas top of the roadster. It held up against the impact, threw her a pace back up into the air; she rolled, coming down in a crouch beside the car. Her knee held.
One of the autogunners saw her just in time to turn and take her sword-thrust in the chest. He fell back against the wall. The other didn’t have time to turn; her bloody sword-point pricked at his throat just as he realized something was horribly wrong. He stiffened.
“Drop the gun,” she suggested. “Open the door. Or join your friend in your next life.”
Out front, the concrete slab levered open again.
Harris glanced back at Gaby, saw her rifle barrel still protruding from the corner. He brought his revolver up, aimed at the hole again, and sucked in a lungful of air for another shout.
Alastair’s head popped up. The doctor turned for a quick look around, caught sight of Harris, and flinched back out of sight.
The halls of Aremorcy Waterways were frantic with activity. Blue-uniformed members of the Novimagos Guard hustled captured gangsters through the tile-walled halls. Other guardsmen, guns drawn, burst into darkened offices to ferret out gangsters who might be hiding. Doc’s associates collected in the cargo house, prowling among the shelves and stacks of wares, using crowbars to pry open interesting-looking containers.
Harris walked through the confusion, glancing numbly at the arrests and the searches. Novimagos guardsmen passed him in the hallways, not seeing him. It was as though he were a ghost. Maybe he was close enough to death that all he needed to do was squint to see the spirit of the man he’d killed.
He passed through the door out of the offices and into the cargo house. Noriko spotted him at once and came to him, favoring her left leg. Something about his expression must have told a story; she asked, “Are you hurt?”
“I killed a man, Noriko.”
She nodded, sympathy briefly evident in her eyes. “And it feels bad.”
“No, that’s just it. It doesn’t feel at all. I keep waiting for it to hit.” He shrugged. “Isn’t it supposed to?”
“If you hadn’t shot him, he would have shot all three of us. I don’t think Alastair could see him from his corner. It was the right thing. We owe you our lives, Harris.”
He frowned. “I don’t get you.”
“The man with the Klapper.”
“No, the man on the sidewalk—oh.” Harris sagged. “You mean I got the guy in the window, too. I shot two men to death tonight.” He took a deep breath and waited. Maybe now something would happen to him, some blast of guilt like a lightning bolt from the hand of Zeus.
Nothing did.
Doc called, “Noriko? Tell me what you think of this.”
She gave Harris an apologetic look and headed Doc’s way. The investigation wasn’t waiting for the lightning bolt of Zeus.
An unaccustomed weight in his coat pocket reminded him that he was still carrying the dead man’s gun. He pulled it out to look at it.
It was strange. It was as long as a sawed-off shotgun, but with a single barrel and a large cylinder like a revolver’s. It had a swing-out cylinder like his small revolver. He pressed the catch for it and popped the cylinder out. It held four shotgun shells. He closed the weapon.
There was a loop of white cord tied to the front of the gun, just under the barrel. The cord continued along the left side of the barrel and was tied off to a knob near the trigger. He could tug on the cord and draw the loop closed.
Alastair, visible between crates on the far side of a set of shelves, said, “It’s a Wexstan.”
“It’s weird.”
“Sportsman’s weapon. For birdstalkers who liked to get close to their quarry. Also for snakes that get too close.” He came around the set of shelves to give the thing a better look. “This is the way gangsters modify the things. See the loop of rope? Drop it over a victim’s head and draw it tight over his neck, and you ensure cooperation. If the victim tries to yank free, he’ll probably yank the trigger. That’s the end of the victim. The gangster can draw the loop tighter to control his victim. It’s very good for kidnapping.”
“Charming.” Harris handed the weapon off to the next guardsman.
The second floor of the office building had been arranged into bedrooms and barracks rooms. Lieutenant Athelstane reported that the building had, until recently, housed more than the thirty or so men the raid had killed or captured. “We have a singer,” he told Doc. “But he won’t perform in sight of the others.”
“Let’s find him a private office,” Doc said.
One of the offices downstairs was actually set up for business, with a desk and an adding machine nearly as big as an old-fashioned cash register. Alastair brought in extra chairs for Doc’s associates.
Athelstane dragged in one of the captured gangsters. This man had a square face and slack expression under intelligent-looking eyes. His ears rose to a dramatic point; his hair was blond and he was clean-shaven. He was dressed only in trousers, and his hands were shackled in front of him with handcuffs the color of tarnished copper. Athelstane shoved him into the chair behind the desk; Jean-Pierre turned the desk lamp so it shined into his face. The man’s eyes watered from the light. He grimaced but didn’t complain.