Part 28 (1/2)
Though Kronstadt was a big town, bursting its medieval walls, it took Golescu three trips, to three separate chemists' shops, to obtain all the items on the list but the chocolate. It took him the best part of an hour to get the chocolate, too, using all his guile and patience to convince the confectioner's a.s.sistant to sell him a block of raw material.
”You'd have thought I was trying to buy state secrets,” Golescu said to himself, trudging away with a scant half-pound block wrapped in waxed paper. ”Pfui! Such drudge work, Golescu, is a waste of your talents. What are you , a mere donkey to send on errands?”
And when he returned to the camp outside town, he got nothing like the welcome he felt he deserved. Amaunet seized the carry-sack from him and went through it hurriedly, as he stood before her with aching feet. She pulled out the block of chocolate and stared at it. She trembled slightly, her nostrils flared. Golescu thought it made her look uncommonly like a horse.
”I don't suppose you've cooked any supper for me?” he inquired.
Amaunet started, and turned to him as though he had just asked for a roasted baby in caper sauce.
”No! Go back into Kronstadt. Buy yourself something at a tavern. In fact, take a room. I don't want to see you back here for two days, understand? Come back at dawn on the third day.”
”I see,” said Golescu, affronted. ”In that case I'll just go collect my purse and an overnight bag, shall I? Not that I don't trust you, of course.”
Amaunet's reply was to turn her back and vanish into the wagon, bearing the sack clutched to her bosom.
Carrying his satchel, Golescu cheered up a little as he walked away. Cash, a change of clothes, and no authorities in pursuit!
He was not especially concerned that Amaunet would use his absence to move on. The people of the road had a limited number of places they could ply their diverse trades, and he had been one of their number long enough to know the network of market fairs and circuses that made up their itinerary. He had only to follow the route of the vardas, and sooner or later he must find Amaunet again. Unless, of course, she left the road and settled down; then she would be harder to locate than an egg in a snowstorm. Or an ink bottle in a coal cellar. Or... he amused himself for at least a mile composing unlikely similes.
Having returned to Kronstadt just as dusk fell, Golescu paused outside a low dark door. There was no sign to tell him a tavern lav within, but the fume of wine and brandy breathing out spoke eloquently to him. He went in, ducking his head, and as soon as his eyes had adjusted to the dark he made out the bar, the barrels, the tables in dark corners he had expected to see.
”A gla.s.s of schnapps, please,” he said to the sad-faced publican. There were silent drinkers at the tables, some watching him with a certain amount of suspicion, some ignoring him. One or two appeared to be dead, collapsed over their drinks. Only a pair of cattle herders standing near the bar were engaged in conversation. Golescu smiled cheerily at one and all, slapped down his coin, and withdrew with his gla.s.s to an empty table.
”...Hunting for him everywhere,” one of the drovers was saying. ”He was selling this stuff that was supposed to make chickens lay better eggs.”
”Has anybody been killed?” said the other drover.
”I didn't hear enough to know, but they managed to shoot most of them-”
Golescu, quietlv as he could, half-rose and turned his chair so he was facing away from the bar.
Raising his gla.s.s to his lips, he looked over its rim and met the eves of someone propped in a dark corner.
”To your very good health,” he said, and drank.
”What's that you've got in the satchel?” said the person in the corner.
”Please, sir, my mummy sent me to the market to buy bread,” said Golescu, smirking. The stranger arose and came near. Golescu drew back involuntarily. The stranger ignored his reaction and sat down at Golescu's table.
He was an old man in rusty black, thin to gauntness, his shabby coat b.u.t.toned high and tight. He was bald, with drawn and waxen features, and he smelled a bit; but the stare of his eyes was intimidating.
They shone like pearls, milky as though he were blind.
”You travel with Mother Aegypt, eh?” said the old man.
”And who would that be?” inquired Golescu, setting his drink down. The old man looked scornful.
”I know her,” he said. ”Madame Amaunet. I travel, too. I saw you at the market fair in Arges, loafing outside her wagon. You do the talking for her, don't you, and run her errands? I've been following you.”
”You must have me confused with some other handsome fellow,” said Golescu.
”Pfft.” The old man waved his hand dismissively. ”I used to work for her, too. She's never without a slave to do her bidding.”
”Friend, I don't do anyone's bidding,” said Golescu, but he felt a curious pang of jealously. ”And she's only a poor weak woman, isn't she?”
The old man laughed. He creaked when he laughed.
”Tell me, is she still collecting trash for the Devil?”
”What Devil is that?” said Golescu, leaning back and trying to look amused.
”Her master. I saw him, once.” The old man reached up absently and swatted a fly that had landed on his cheek. ”Soldiers had looted a mosque, they stole a big golden lamp. She paid them cash for it. It wasn't so heavy, but it was, you know, awkward. And when we drove up to the Teufelberg to unload all the goods, she made me help her bring out the lamp, so as not to break off the fancy work. I saw him there, the Devil. Waiting beside his long wagons. He looked like a prosperous Saxon.”
”Sorry, my friend, I don't know what you're talking about,” said Golescu. He drew a deep breath and plunged on: ”Though I have heard of a lord of thieves who is, perhaps, known in certain circles as the Devil. Am I correct? just the sort of powerful fellow who has but to pull a string and corrupt officials rush to do his bidding? And he acc.u.mulates riches without lifting a finger?”
The old man creaked again.
”You think you've figured it out,” he said. ”And you think he has a place for a fast-talking fellow in his gang, don't you?”
Taken aback, Golescu just stared at him. He raised his drink again.
”Mind reader, are you?”
”I was a fool, too,” said the old man, smacking the table for emphasis, though his hand made no more sound than an empty glove. ”Thought I'd make a fortune. Use her to work my way up the ladder. I hadn't the slightest idea what she really was.”
”What is she, grandfather?” said Golescu, winking broadly at the publican. The publican shuddered and looked away. The old man, ignoring or not noticing, leaned forward and said in a lowered voice: ”There are stregoi who walk this world. You don't believe it, you laugh, but it's true. They aren't interested in your soul. They crave beautiful things. Whenever there is a war, they hover around its edges like flies, stealing what they can when the armies loot. If a house is going to catch fire and burn to the ground, they know; you can see them lurking in the street beforehand, and how their eyes gleam! They're only waiting for night, when they can slip in and take away paintings, carvings, books, whatever is choice and rare, before the flames come. Sometimes they take children, too.
”She's one of them. But she's tired, she's lazy. She buys from thieves, instead of doing the work herself. The Devil doesn't care. He just takes what she brings him. Back she goes on her rounds, then, from fair to fair, and even the murderers cross themselves when her shadow falls on them, but still they bring her pretty things. Isn't it so?”
”What do you want, grandfather?” said Golescu.
”I want her secret,” said the old man. ”I'll tell you about it, and then you can steal it and bring it back here, and we'll share. How would you like eternal youth, eh?”
”I'd love it,” said Golescu patiently. ”But there's no such thing.”
”Then you don't know Mother Aegypt very well!” said the old man, grinning like a skull. ”I used to watch through the door when she'd mix her Black Cup. Does she still have the little mummy case, with the powders inside?”
”Yes,” said Golescu, startled into truthfulness.
”That's how she does it!” said the old man. ”She'd put in a little of this- little of that-she'd grind the powders together, and though I watched for years I could never see all that went in the cup, or what the right amounts were. Spirits of wine, ves, and some strange things-a.r.s.enic, and paint! And she'd drink it down, and weep, and scream as though she was dying. But instead, she'd live. My time slipped away, peering through that door, watching her live. I could have run away from her many times, but I staved, I wasted my life, because I thought I could learn her secrets.
”And one night she caught me watching her, and she cursed me. I ran away. I hid for years. She's forgotten me, now. But when I saw her at Arges, and you with her, I thought-he can help me.
”So! You find out what's in that Black Cup of hers, and bring it back to me. I'll share it with you.
We'll live forever and become rich as kings.”