“You dissing me, boss?”
“I’m not ‘dissing,’ I’m warning. Sometimes, you know, people want to get paid twice for the same job. All right, guys, farewell and hope we never meet again.”
With those words the baron walked out, hesitating at the door for a few seconds: the job awaiting him on the second floor required more than just guts.
Chapter 47
The thing was that the house at 4 Lamp Street was indeed a Gondorian safe house, but its true owners – two Secret Guard sergeants – have taken no part in the above events, having spent all that time bound and gagged in the living room upstairs. The sergeants were captured in a lightning-fast operation devised by Vaddari and Tangorn and carried out with the help of a robber nicknamed Knuckles, who needed to change climate soon. The baron needed a third partner not only for the latter’s skills, but also to make the number of Algali’s abductors match the true number of the house’s residents. Since one of the kidnappers has been ‘killed’ by Tangorn as part of the hoax, one of the sergeants had to die by the sword now. Truly, the World is Text, and there’s no getting away from that, thought the baron as he opened the door to the living room.
“Do you recognize me, boys?” Tangorn took off his mask, so the prisoners had a good chance to compare his visage to the search descriptions while he was getting their gags out. One shrank back and the other went stone-faced; it was clear that they recognized him and expected nothing nice. “Shall we talk first or do I just dice you up?”
The one who had shrunk back erupted in a volley of disjointed curses, obviously trying desperately to push back fear. The other, though, seemed like a tough nut: he gazed at Tangorn levelly, and then spat: “Do what you need to do, rascal! But remember that we’ll catch up with you one day, and then we’ll hang you by the feet, as befits a traitor!”
“Yes, most likely that’s how it’s going to be, at some point,” the baron shrugged, unsheathing his sword (the choice of victim was clear now), “but you won’t be there to see it, I guarantee that.”
With those words he stabbed the prisoner in the chest and pulled the blade out immediately; the blood gush was spectacular. Over the last few years the third sword of Gondor had killed lots of people in battle, but never before did he have to dispatch an unarmed helpless man, albeit a mortal enemy, in cold blood; he understood clearly that he was taking another step beyond the pale, but there was no choice. The only break he allowed himself was to stab precisely in the upper right chest; such a wound is not always fatal, so if the guy was one of Fortune’s favorites, he could possibly make it. The baron did not need a corpse per se, but the wound had to be real, lest the Elves later suspect the whole thing to be a show.
When he turned to the other sergeant, bloody sword in hand, the man tried to push himself off with bound feet and, as Knuckles would say, spilled his guts like a hoisted pig. Swapping the variables does work sometimes… Tangorn had to interrupt his revelations, since he was not very interested in all the goings-on at 12 Shore Street.
“Fine. When did your station start investigating the Elvish underground?”
“I haven’t heard anything about that. Maybe others…”
“What do you mean, you haven’t heard? Why did you kidnap an Elf, then?”
“What Elf?” The man was perplexed.
“All right, not an Elf – the guy from the Elvish underground that I just let out of your basement.”
“I… I don’t understand! We never heard about any Elves!”
“Ah, so I must be hallucinating!” Tangorn smiled ominously. “Or maybe someone planted him in your basement, eh?” “Listen, I told you all I know; if Marandil gets his hands on me, I’m finished. Why would I lie?”
“Enough of this crap! I’ll have you know that I’ve located this house of yours by following that guy from the Elvish underground – Algali, Junior Secretary of the Foreign Ministry. And I saw with my own eyes how two costumed guys first gave him some potion and then dragged him into this mansion of yours. So I decided to pay you a visit… Unless there’s two more of your people somewhere around here?”
“No, I swear by anything, no! We haven’t kidnapped anybody!” The sergeant’s eyes looked crazy, with good reason.
“Well, well, looks like I’ve finally found something worthwhile in the pile of scraps you’re trying to feed me. Looks like this is your main operation and you’re ready to sacrifice anything to cover it up… except now I’m really interested, so don’t expect to die as quickly and easily as your buddy here! Know what I’m going to do to you first?”
The sergeant was one of those people who think much better when they are scared. To avoid the nightmare the baron had promised he instantaneously invented his own version of events: they had Marandil’s undocumented oral order to capture Algali, Junior Secretary of the Foreign Ministry. Tangorn pointed out some inconsistencies, the man immediately made corrections to his tale, and this back-and-forth went on until the story became logically consistent and sounded true. In reality, baron’s deft leading questions simply prompted the sergeant to put together the legend he himself had developed in the past few days.
After the sergeant had committed the legend to paper, twice, Tangorn renewed his bonds, took both sergeant’s badges (the talkative one was Aravan, the tough one was Morimir; the baron checked the latter’s carotid artery while removing the chain from around his neck and found a pulse), and left the house to his involuntary interlocutor’s frenzied cries: “Untie me! Let me go!” By Tangorn’s design, the later the man fell into his friends’ hands at 12 Shore Street, the better; the baron took care to find a policeman (not an easy task on Carnival night) and let him know that the door to 4 Lamp Street was open slightly and someone was calling for help inside: “Doesn’t sound like a joke – perhaps some drunk is misbehaving?” Then he put Aravan’s testimony and badge into the letter destined for Kharmian Village. The other copy he addressed to the ambassador of the Reunited Kingdom: let him and Marandil try and puzzle it all out. Bafflement breeds inaction, as is well known.
Tangorn made it back to the Flying Fish by dawn and fell asleep like a log. The deed was done and all he had to do was wait: the lure he had dropped – the real name of one of the underground leaders – was too good to be passed up. The Elves couldn’t ignore the meeting; at the very least they’d show up to kill him. Their checking will probably take a few days, so he should only go to the Green Mackerel next Friday, the twentieth. Now he had enough time to plan both the talk with Elandar and the cover and escape routes.
“…He will only talk to Elandar himself, as he’s not interested in flunkies.” “You are mad!” The gaze of the Great Magister was terrible. “He can’t possibly know this name, nor can anyone outside Lórien!”
“Nevertheless, that’s what he said, milord. Should we contact him?”
“Definitely, but I will do it myself – this is too important. Either he really does have some important information, in which case we need to get it, or he is provoking us and we must liquidate him before it’s too late. How long will it take your security service to verify this weird miraculous rescue story?”
“I believe that four days will be sufficient, milord. You should be able to visit the Green Mackerel this Friday.”