“He’s my doctor, that’s all.”
“No,” Silk said. “He is indeed your doctor, but that’s not all. When Orchid and I heard someone scream and went out into the courtyard, you were fully dressed. It was very noticeable, because you were the only woman present who was.”
“I was going out!”
“Yes, precisely. You were going out, and thus dressed, which I found a great relief—sneer if you like. I didn’t begin, of course, by asking myself why you were dressed, but why the others weren’t; and the answers were harmless and straightforward enough. They’d been up late the previous night. Furthermore, they expected to be examined by Crane, who would make them disrobe in any event, so there was no reason for them to dress until he’d left.
“Crane and I had arrived together just a few minutes earlier, yet you were fully dressed, which was why I noticed you and asked you to bring something to cover poor Orpine’s body. The obvious inference is that you had been examined already; and if so, you must certainly have been first. It seemed possible that Crane had begun at the far end of the corridor, but he didn’t—this room is only halfway to the old manteion at the back of the house. Why did he take you first?”
“I don’t know,” Chenille said. “I didn’t even know I was. I was waiting for him, and he came in. If nothing’s wrong, it only takes a second or two.”
“He sells you rust, doesn’t he?”
Surprised, Chenille laughed.
“I see I’m wrong—so much for logic. But Crane has rust; he mentioned it to me this morning as something that he could have given me to make me feel better. Orchid and a friend who knows you have both told me you use it, and neither has reason to lie. Furthermore, your behavior when you encountered Orpine confirms it.”
Chenille appeared about to speak, and Silk waited for her to do so while silence collected in the stuffy room. At last she said, “I’ll level with you, Patera. If I give you the lily word, will you believe me?”
“If you tell me the truth? Yes, certainly.”
“All right. Crane doesn’t sell me, or anybody, rust. Blood would have his tripes if he did. If you want it, you’re supposed to buy it from Orchid. But some girls buy it outside sometimes. I do myself, once in a while. Don’t tell them.”
“I won’t,” Silk assured her.
“Only you’re dead right, Crane’s got it, and sometimes he gives me some, like today. We’re friends, you know what I mean? I’ve done him a few favors and I don’t charge him. So he looks at me first, and sometimes he gives me a little present.”
“Thank you,” Silk said. “And thank you for calling me Patera. I noticed and appreciated that, believe me. Do you want to tell me about Orpine now?”
Chenille shook her head stubbornly.
“Very well, then. You said that Orpine had never been possessed, but that was mendacious—she was possessed at the time of her death, in fact.” The moment had come, Silk felt, to stretch the truth in a good cause. “Did you really think that I, an anointed augur, could view her body and not realize that? When Crane had gone you took some of the rust he’d given you, dressed, and left your room by that other door, stepping out onto the gallery, which you call the gangway.” Silk paused, inviting contradiction.
“I don’t know where you had your dagger, but last year we found that one of the girls at our school had a dagger strapped to her thigh. At any rate, while you were coming down those wooden steps, you came face-to-face with Orpine, possessed. If you hadn’t taken the rust Crane gave you, you would probably have screamed and fled; but rust makes people bold and violent. That was how I hurt my ankle last night, as it happens; I encountered a woman who used rust.
“In spite of the rust, Orpine’s appearance must have horrified you; you realized you were confronting the devil all of you have come to fear, and your only thought was to kill her. You drew your dagger and stabbed her once, just below the ribs with the blade angled up.”
“She said I was beautiful,” Chenille whispered. “She tried to touch me, to stroke my face. It wasn’t Orpine—I might have knifed Orpine, but not for that. I backed away. She kept coming, and I knifed her. I knifed the devil, and then it was Orpine lying there dead.”
Silk nodded. “I understand.”
“You figured out my dagger, didn’t you? I didn’t think of it until it was too late.”
“The picture representing your name, you mean. Yes, I did. I had been thinking about Orpine’s name ever since I’d heard it. There’s no point in going into that here, but I had. Crane gave you the dagger, isn’t that right? You said a moment ago that he occasionally makes you a present. Your dagger must have been one of them.”
“You think he gave it to me to get me into trouble,” Chenille said. “It wasn’t like that at all.”
“What was it like?”
“One of the other girls had one. She has, most of us have—do you really care about all this?”
“Yes,” Silk told her. “I do.”
“So she went out that night. She was going to meet him someplace to eat, I guess, only a couple of culls jumped her and tried to pull her down. She plucked, and cut them both. That’s what she says. Then she beat the hoof, only she’d got blood on her.
“So I wanted to get one for when I go out, but I don’t know much about them, so I asked Crane where I could get a good one, where they wouldn’t cheat me. He said he didn’t know either, but he’d find out from Musk, because Musk knows all about knives and the rest of it, so next time he brought me that one. He’d got it specially made for me, or anyhow the picture put on.”
“I see.”
“Do you know, Patera, I’d never even seen chenille, not to know it was my flower anyway, till he brought me a bouquet for my room last spring? And I love it—that’s when I did my hair this color. He said sometimes they call it burning cattail. We laugh about it, so when I asked he gave me the dagger. Bucks buy dells things like that pretty often, to show they trust her not to do anything.”
“Is Doctor Crane the friend you mentioned?”
“No. That’s somebody younger. Don’t make me tell you who, unless you want to get me hurt.” Chenille fell silent, tight-lipped. “That’s abram. This’s going to hurt me a lot more, isn’t it? But if I don’t tell, he might help me if he can.”
“Then I won’t ask you again,” Silk said. “And I’m not going to tell Orchid or Blood, unless I must to save someone else. If the Guard were investigating, I suppose I’d have to tell the officer in charge, but I believe it might be a far worse injustice to turn you over to Blood than to permit you to go unpunished. Since that’s the case, I’ll let you go unpunished, or almost unpunished, if you’ll do as I ask. Orpine’s service will take place at eleven tomorrow, at my manteion on Sun Street. Orchid’s going to demand that all of you to attend it, and doubtless many of you will. I want you to be among those who do.”
Chenille nodded. “Yeah. Sure, Patera.”
“And while the service is in progress, I want you to pray for Orpine and Orchid, as well as for yourself. Will you do that as well?”
“To Hierax? All right, Patera, if you’ll tell me what to say.”
Silk gripped Blood’s walking stick, flexing it absently between his hands. “Hierax is indeed the god of death and the caldé of the dead, and as such is the most appropriate object of worship at any such service. It will be Scylsday, however, and thus our sacrifice cannot be his alone.”
“Uh-huh. That’s about the only prayer I know—what they call her short litany. Will that be all right?”
Silk laid aside the stick and leaned toward Chenille, his decision made. “There is one more god to whom I wish you to pray—a very powerful one who may be able to help you, as well as Orchid and poor Orpine. He is called the Outsider. Do you know anything about him?”