Here came another guard, this one as indifferent to the door to Talsu's new cell as the first fellow had been. Behind him walked a woman. She wasn't a prisoner- her person and clothes were clean. At first, that was all Talsu noticed. Then he recognized his wife. He started to scream, "Gailisa!" in spite of the guard's warning. But he almost blessed the gag, which reminded him he must not make a sound.
Another guard followed Gailisa, but Talsu hardly saw him. His eyes were only on his wife, and he couldn't have seen her for more than two heartbeats, three at the outside. Then she was gone. The corridor was just a corridor again.
"You see?" the lead guard said with complacency that was almost obscene. "We have her, too. It won't get any better for you, and oh, how easy it can get worse."
He didn't bother ordering his henchmen to ungag Talsu before they took him back to his own cell. If any other captives were looking out and saw a gagged man marched down a corridor, what would that do except make them more likely to submit to escape a similar fate?
After they took Talsu back, after they released him from the gag, they let him stew in his own juice for a couple of days. Only then did they haul him out again and bring him before the constabulary captain who served King Mainardo as ready as he had served King Donalitu.
"Talsu son of Traku." The captain sounded reproachful. "Do you see what your stubbornness has got you? We had no choice but to bring in your wife for interrogation, too. And what she told us… I wouldn't say it looks good. No, by the powers above, I wouldn't say that at all."
I don't believe you, Talsu started to say. But he bit that back almost in the same way he'd bitten back Gailisa's name there in the cell with the peephole. Anything he said gave them a greater hold on him. He stood there and waited.
"Aye, she's turned on you," the constabulary captain said. "And she's given us enough denunciations to keep us busy for quite a while, that she has." He eyed Talsu. "What have you got to say about that?"
"Nothing, sir," Talsu answered. Eventually, this would end.
"Nothing?" Now disbelief filled the officer's voice. "Nothing? I can't believe my ears. Well, that's not what your pretty little Gailisa had to say. She sang like a redbreast- and she sang about you." He pointed a forefinger at Talsu as if it were a stick.
That bit of overacting convinced Talsu of what he'd only hoped before: that the captain was lying. He was sure Gailisa would never betray him, not like that, not for anything. He said, "Well, sir, you've already got me."
"And we'll have all the rebels in Skrunda before long," the constabulary captain said. "Make it easy on yourself like your wife did. Help us."
"But I have no names to give you," Talsu said, more than a little desperation in his voice. "We've cut these trousers before." He knew what would come at the end of such protestations, too: another beating. If that was the routine for interrogations, he wouldn't be sorry to disrupt it.
Sure enough, the guards behind him growled in eager anticipation. They knew what would come, too, and they looked forward to it. So much in life depended on whether one did or was done to.
"Here." The captain picked up a sheet of paper with writing on it and waved it in Talsu's face. "Your wife has given us a list of names. You see? She's not so shy, not so shy at all. And now, for both your sakes, I'd better have a list of names from you. And a good many of the names on it had better match the ones on this list here, or you'll be even sorrier than you are already. You may take that to the bank, Talsu son of Traku."
Seeing the list did rock Talsu. Was the constable lying? Or had Gailisa given him names? Would she do that, in the hope of freeing Talsu? She might. Talsu knew only too well that she might. She'd never betray him, but she might betray others to save him. He might have done the same for her.
What names would she give, though? She wouldn't know anyone who really was involved in fighting the Algarvian occupiers. Such people did not advertise. Talsu had gone looking for them when he started learning classical Kaunian, and whom had he found? Kugu the silversmith, Kugu the traitor. Which meant…
"Curse you," Talsu said, and the guards behind him growled again. But, before they could do anything more than growl, he went on, "Let me have some paper and a pen. I'll give you what you want. Just leave my wife alone."
"I knew we would find a key to pick your lock." The constabulary captain smiled broadly. With an almost Algarvian flourish, he passed Talsu the writing tools. "Remember what I told you."
"I'm not likely to forget," Talsu mumbled as he started to write.
He still didn't know for a fact that Gailisa had given the constabulary captain any names at all. The fellow hadn't let him get a good enough look at the list to recognize her writing. But if she had written down names, whose names would they be?
Most likely, Talsu judged, the names of people who liked the Algarvians well enough but weren't out-and-out lickspittles- using those would have made what she was up to only too clear. Talsu knew a good many people of that sort. And the redheads and their Jelgavan hounds wouldn't be able to trust people like that: after all, such folk might just be putting up a good front.
And so, wishing the worst to those who seemed happy under an Algarvian puppet king, Talsu set down a dozen names and then, after a little thought, three or four more. He passed his list back to the constabulary captain. "These are the ones I can think of."
"Let's see what we've got." The captain compared the sheet he'd got from Talsu to the one he'd waved. Maybe Gailisa really had given him a list. Maybe he wasn't such a dreadful actor after all. He clicked his tongue between his teeth. "Isn't that interesting?" he murmured. "There are some matches. I must admit I'm a little surprised. You took a long time coming to your senses, Talsu son of Traku, but I'm glad you've finally seen who has the strength in this new and greater Jelgava."
"That's pretty plain," Talsu said, which wasn't altogether untrue: had things been the other way round, men who served redheaded King Mainardo could never had laid hands on Gailisa.
"We shall have to do some more investigating- aye, indeed we shall," the captain said, at least half to himself. "Powers above only know what may have been going on right under our noses. Well, if it was, we'll put a stop to it. Aye, we will."
"What about me?" Talsu demanded. "I've given you what you wanted." He sounded like a girl who'd just let a seducer have his way with her. He felt like that, too. He'd yielded, but the constabulary captain wasn't doing anything for him.
The captain tapped the list with a fingernail. "What about you? I don't know yet. We'll find out. If you've done us some good, we'll do you some good. If you haven't…" He tapped it again. "If you haven't, you'll be sorry you tried to get clever with us." He nodded to the guards. "Take him back to his cell."
Back Talsu went. The guards didn't work him over. That was something. He returned to his place in time for supper. That was something, too. Routine returned. He wondered when it would end again… when, and how.
Pybba the pottery magnate was about fifty, with energy enough to wear down any three men half his age. He certainly left Ealstan panting. "Don't complain," he boomed. "Don't carp. Just do the work, young fellow. As long as you do the work, everything will be fine. That's why I sacked the bookkeeper I had before you: he couldn't keep up. Couldn't come close to keeping up. I need someone who will attend. If you will, I'll pay you. If you won't, I'll boot you out on your arse. Is that plain enough?"