Carlyle summoned his grimmest tone, still light despite himself. “Does J.E.D.D. Mason proselytize?”
“What?”
“Has J.E.D.D. Mason ever told you what religion they believe in? Have they tried to get you to convert?”
Chagatai’s face grew chill.
“They’ve already crossed a lot of lines,” Carlyle pushed. “Exploiting your theology, these names too, Martin, Dominic. This is serious, a First Law question; on behalf of the Conclave I have to know. Has J.E.D.D. Mason tried to convert you to a secret organized religion? Is that what’s going on?”
The true medieval iron of a Blacklaw’s gaze turned now on Carlyle. “Do you think I would stay in a house with a boss who broke the First Law?”
“Then, they haven’t?”
“Of course not.” The iron faded now behind a smile. “One of the first conversations I had with T.M. seven years ago was them warning me never to bring up theology in this house, or to speculate about T.M.’s, or their valet would kill me.”
“Valet?”
“Dominic.”
Thisbe sat up stiff. “They threatened you?”
“No, it was a friendly warning. Dominic’s a Blacklaw too, and mad possessive, and already has it in for me for edging in on the privilege of polishing T.M.’s boots and changing their sheets and all that. T.M. says they want Dominic for more important work than housekeeping, but it’s an old fight between the pair that’ll probably never finish. I try not to get involved, but if I muscled in on sensayery-business with T.M. too, then smart money says I’d wake up dead.”
“J.E.D.D. Mason’s sensayer … is also their valet and … Are they…” Carlyle took a forkful of strudel, hoping to keep himself from asking something rash. The strudel, he remembers, was exquisite, but sweetness on the tongue cannot drive gall from the mind. “Excuse me, where did you say your bathroom was?”
“Second on the left.”
From here I have less detail, for Thisbe and Chagatai do a poor job reconstructing scenes. Thisbe asked Chagatai if J.E.D.D. Mason had any hobbies or interests apart from work and messing with people’s theology. Chagatai answered that J.E.D.D. Mason’s most common activities, at least at home, were reading, conducting business over His tracker, sitting perfectly still doing nothing, and, the all-time favorite, lying perfectly still doing nothing.
“Sleeping?” she suggested.
“Sometimes,” the Blacklaw answered. “Often not.”
Meanwhile, in the bland but tasteful bathroom, Carlyle, in a rare moment of lie becoming truth, filed a quick report to the Sensayer’s Conclave of his deep concerns regarding Dominic Seneschal. Then, cleansed by the feeling of good action, he searched the house. He reviewed the hall of icons first, then the sitting room, with its fireplace, sofas, and coffee table, all wood and silk and ornament to thrill an antiquarian, but with a starkness to it, a show room, not a room for living. In the library he caught the two students admiring a spider they had trapped under a cup, and in the back room he heard sweet things about me from the grateful rescued “young thing.” (Sometimes we Servicers retain old business from our dark days, reader, and sometimes we help each other solve it.) Chagatai’s bedroom was easy to spot by its stacks of cookbooks and tomorrow’s suit ready to go, and the guest bedrooms were clear by their suitcases. That left only one door to try.
“There you are!” Thisbe appeared behind Carlyle just as he opened it. “I told Chagatai we needed to head out. I’m on duty soon. Did you have a good snoop?”
Carlyle stood frozen, staring, unable to release the knob. “Their bedroom.”
“What?”
“This is J.E.D.D. Mason’s bedroom.”
Carlyle pulled the door back. A mattress with plain sheets lay on the floor, without blanket, pillow or bed frame. The closet door, ajar, revealed six shirts on hangers, the antique black He always wore. And nothing more.
“That’s kind of scary,” Thisbe admitted, checking the empty drawers. “Though it’s less scary knowing they don’t really live here.”
Carlyle stared in silence for some moments. “No. The rest of the rooms are comfortable, guest-ready. This … this has to be their preference.”
They thought on that for some moments, before Thisbe turned dark eyes again on the sensayer. “I could tell you almost lost it over what they said about Dominic.”
Carlyle flinched. “Sensayer and valet, and possessive, and probably a bash’mate too, or worse. All the earmarks of unhealthy. It would be scary anywhere, but, so close to major powers, a cult could be the kind of disaster we’re most afraid of. J.E.D.D. Mason has access to the Emperor. To Andō. To everything.”
Thisbe gave a long frown. “You’re right to be worried. And you’re right that it’s a First Law issue, but the danger of a cult is a lot more … long-term than the danger of eight hundred million cars all shutting down tomorrow, and also a lot less important than what threat this might pose to a certain kid. My questions trump yours, and you need to stay calm so I can keep coaxing out the answers we’re really here for. You jump on the conversation like that again and I’ll send you home and go to Paris on my own. Understood?”
Objections parted his lips, but stopped there. “Yes. You’re right.”
“Are you ready to go back in there? I’m sure I can coast on this bluff a while longer, but you look like you’re struggling.”
“I’m fine,” Carlyle resolved. “I’ll stay. Though this Blacklaw’s main feature seems to be knowing as little as possible about J.E.D.D. Mason’s family and political life. Should we move on toward Paris before someone catches us here?”
She considered, but shook her head, black hair flowing like oil. “I want to see if this roast really can lure in that Dominic. Plus our chef says there’s a step coming up which we can eat, not the final thing but an intermediate thing that involves almonds, and smells incredible.”
The growl of Carlyle’s tummy decided for him. “Excellent!”
“One thing.” She stopped him in the doorway. “After I’m done and satisfied with my investigation, then you report this to the Sensayer’s Conclave, not before. I don’t want people getting poked and clamming up, not with so much at risk.”
Carlyle winced as he described this part. “Of course, Thisbe. You have my word.”
It is possible to delete reports sent to the Conclave. It is not possible, amid the many lies, to be quite certain who saw it before Carlyle deleted it.
CHAPTER THE TWENTIETH
A Monster in the House
Gunfire could not have spooked me so completely as Bridger’s silence when I called to check on him after my hours in the Censor’s office. Night’s westward march had advanced from Tōgenkyō as far as Europe, and I had been ordered to get some hours’ sleep, but it did not occur to me that I was sacrificing something as I lied my way into a car. Bridger did not answer. The Major did not answer. No one answered for that agonizing hour’s flight across the unyielding Atlantic. Fears drowned me so completely I did not even mark when midnight touched Western Europe and set the Seven-Ten lists free into the world. I did not call Thisbe. I almost did, but what if it was something with her bash’? The thief again? Or the opposite, police? Those were my justifications. Really, I think, I was angry at Thisbe forcing out what I had hidden so long, my Tocqueville. It was the kind of anger we create to mask our guilt.
The cave was dark, but I found Bridger in Thisbe’s bedroom, huddling as a caged rat huddles in a sterile corner, praying in its tiny mind for some rag or scrap of newspaper to hide beneath. My arms were Bridger’s rag, and he hurled himself into their sanctuary hard enough to wind me.