Book 1 - Sweet Silver Blues Read Online Free PDF Page A

painful, and prefer instead to snatch up a sword at the first
hint of . . . 
    He was off on his favorite crusade. Soon he would begin the
paeans to the infinite superiority of Loghyr reasoning and logic
and wisdom. I shut him out.
    That can be done if he is distracted by musing upon his own
magnificence, if you’re subtle and don’t draw attention
to what you’re doing. I hid behind my beer and counted
silently. Having heard it all before, I knew how long he needed to
get it out of his system.
    Garrett!
    So I miscalculated by a few seconds. He probably cheated. He
knew me pretty well, too. But he was abnormally mellow. He employed
none of his usual childish devices. Maybe I had given him enough to
crack the boredom of being dead.
    “Yes?”
    Pay attention. I asked if you are determined to go ahead
with this.
    “I’m not sure.”
    Your body calls your mouth a liar. I have this advice for
you, inasmuch as you mean to go ahead despite all reason. Do not go
this one alone. And do not permit emotion to get in the way of your
usually strong instinct for your own best interest. Whatever else
this woman may be or may have been, she is not the girl you loved
when she was seventeen. No more are you that callow Marine of
nineteen. If ever, for a minute, you allow yourself to believe
that those days can be restored, you are lost. They are dead. Take
it from an expert on being dead. There is no way to get your health
back. You live on memories of what was and fancies about what might
have been. Both can be deadly to the man who loses sight of the
demarcation between them and reality.
    “End of speech?”
    End of speech. Were you listening?
    “I was listening.”
    Did you hear me?
    “I heard.”
    It is well. You are a pestilence upon my waning centuries,
Garrett, but you keep me amused. I do not want to lose you yet. Be
careful in the Cantard. You will not have me there to lift you out
of the consequences of your folly. It grates, but I fear I would
miss you, insolence, disobedience, and all.
    Which was about the nicest thing he ever said to me. I had to
get out before we started getting maudlin.
    I made a beer run before going back to give him his bath and his
place a bit of cleanup.
     
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7
    It was past suppertime when I left the Dead Man’s place.
The shadows were long and indigo. The sky was turning colors you
usually see only in elvish portraiture. It had been a long day, and
there was a lot of it yet to go.
    The first order of business would be to see the Dead Man’s
landlord and get him a few months ahead on his rent.
    I’ll buy the place for him if I ever make the big strike,
though he could do that for himself if he wanted. It would,
however, take several months of concentrated work for him to earn
enough money. The very thought sends him into psychic spasms.
    Next step would be to look up Morley Dotes, which I’d had
in mind even before the Dead Man admonished me against following my
usual lone-wolf course. He was right. The Cantard is no place to go
alone.
    A massive hand hurtled out of an alley mouth, snagged my arm,
and yanked.
    Sometimes the city isn’t so safe either.
    I slammed into a wall and slid away from a fist I sensed more
than I saw. I threw a feeble right that was just a distractor while
I unloaded a girlish shin kick. The mountain of muscle and gristle
before me waltzed back far enough for me to take in its true
dimensions. They were awesome.
    “Saucerhead Tharpe.”
    “Hey, Garrett. Man. If I’d knowed it was you,
I’d never have taken this job.”
    “Shucks. I bet you say that to all the boys.”
    “Aw. Don’t be that way, Garrett. We all got to make
it the best way we know how.”
    I caught a glimpse of a familiar short person watching from
across the street.
    I dragged out a fat purse containing part of the largesse her
uncle had bestowed upon me earlier.
    “Hey. Come on, Garrett. You know you can’t bribe me
to lay off. I’m really sorry this’s got to be you and
me. But I