Soul Music Read Online Free PDF Page A

pointed up at a sign.
    “Gimlet’s Hole Food?” said Lias. “Gimlet? Sounds dwarfish. Vermincelli and stuff?”
    “Now he’s doing troll food too,” said Glod. “Decided to put aside ethnic differences in the cause of making more money. Five types of coal, seven types of coke and ash, sediments to make you dribble. You’ll like it.”
    “Dwarf bread too?” said Imp.
    “ You like dwarf bread?” said Glod.
    “Llove it,” said Imp.
    “What, proper dwarf bread?” said Glod. “You sure ?”
    “Yes. It’s nice and crunchy, see.”
    Glod shrugged.
    “That proves it,” he said. “No one who likes dwarf bread can be elvish.”
    The place was almost empty. A dwarf in an apron that came up to its armpits watched them over the top of the counter.
    “You do fried rat?” said Glod.
    “Best damn fried rat in the city,” said Gimlet.
    “Okay. Give me four fried rats.”
    “And some dwarf bread,” said Imp.
    “And some coke,” said Lias, patiently.
    “You mean rat heads or rat legs?”
    “No. Four fried rats.”
    “And some coke.”
    “You want ketchup on those rats?”
    “No.”
    “You sure ?”
    “No ketchup.”
    “And some coke.”
    “And two hard-boilled eggs,” said Imp. The others gave him an odd look.
    “Well? I just like hard-boilled eggs, see,” he said.
    “And some coke.”
    “And two hard-boilled eggs.”
    “And some coke.”
    “Seventy-five dollars,” said Glod, as they sat down. “What’s three times seventy-five dollars?”
    “Many dollars,” said Lias.
    “More than two hundred dollllars,” said Imp.
    “I don’t think I’ve even seen two hundred dollars,” said Glod. “Not while I’ve been awake.”
    “We raise money?” said Lias.
    “We can’t raise money by being musicians,” said Imp. “It’s the Guild law. If they catch you they take your instrument and shove—” He stopped. “Let’s just say it’s not much fun for the piccollo pllayer,” he added from memory.
    “I shouldn’t think the trombonist is very happy either,” said Glod, putting some pepper on his rat.
    “I can’t go back home now,” said Imp, “I said I’d…I can’t go back home yet. Even if I could , I’d have to raise monolliths like my brothers. Alll they care about is stone circles.”
    “If I go back home now,” said Lias, “I’ll be clubbing druids.”
    They both, very carefully, sidled a little farther away from each other.
    “Then we play somewhere where the Guild won’t find us,” said Glod cheerfully. “We find a club somewhere—”
    “Got a club,” said Lias, proudly. “Got a nail in it.”
    “I mean a nightclub,” said Glod.
    “Still got a nail in it at night.”
    “I happen to know,” said Glod, abandoning that line of conversation, “that there’s a lot of places in the city that don’t like paying Guild rates. We could do a few gigs and raise the money with no trouble.”
    “All three of us together?” said Imp.
    “Sure.”
    “But we pllay dwarf music and human music and trolll music,” said Imp. “I’m not sure they’lll go together. I mean, dwarfs listen to dwarf music, humans listen to human music, trollls listen to trolll music. What do we get if we mix it alll together? It’d be dreadfull.”
    “We’re getting along okay,” said Lias, getting up and fetching the salt from the counter.
    “We’re musicians,” said Glod. “It’s not the same with real people.”
    “Yeah, right,” said the troll.
    Lias sat down.
    There was a cracking noise.
    Lias stood up.
    “Oh,” he said.
    Imp reached over. Slowly and with great care, he picked the remains of his harp off the bench.
    “Oh,” said Lias, again.
    A string curled back with a sad little sound.
    It was like watching the death of a kitten.
    “I won that at the Eisteddfod,” said Imp.
    “Could you glue it back together?” said Glod, eventually.
    Imp shook his head.
    “There’s no one left in Llamedos who knows how, see.”
    “Yes, but in the Street of Cunning