Knight Life (5 page)

    
Sidney snatched it away, scowling, and studied it. His eyebrows knit and he stared, squinting, at the card. Quigley looked over his shoulder. The date of issue was the current month. They stared at the name, and Quigley looked up. “Well, Mr. Penn ...”

    
Arthur looked at him in befuddlement. “Who's ‘Mr. Penn' ... ?”

    
“According to this card, you are.” He held it up and Arthur leaned forward, looking at the name in the embossed letters.

    
“Ah. So I am.” He sounded a bit sheepish about it. “Arthur Penn. Yes, that would be me.”

    
For a moment Sidney wondered if the card was stolen, and then decided that it would be far better if such concerns were American Express's rather than his. He quickly processed the card for the cost of the suit, not even bothering to add in the cost of the door (still preferring to stick to his story about vandals). He handed it back to Arthur, who was watching with amusement Quigley's attempts to stuff the pieces of armor into a variety of different boxes and bags.

    
“Don't bother, please,” he said, laying a hand on Quigley's shoulder. “I assure you that if I never see the wretched stuff again, it will not trouble me at all.” A stiff wind was blowing through the destroyed door, and Arthur felt the
chill even through the buttoned suit jacket. “You know, I think I might have need of an overcoat.”

    
Sidney dashed around to a rack of coats, picked a long tan one out, ran back and gave it to Arthur. “This is perfect. It'll be just what you need.”

    
He regarded the coat with scrutiny. “You don't have anything in purple, do you?”

    
“Not unless you're a pimp,” Quigley said helpfully. Then he shut up as Sidney glared at him.

    
“No need for concern, then. This will do just fine.” He slid it on, signed “Arthur Penn” on the charge receipt, took back the card, and then frowned. “I should pay for this coat as well … and certainly breaking the door was …”

    
“Please,” Sidney said, and his voice began to tremble, “please. Please go. I can't take this much longer.”

    
“All right,” said Arthur, a trifle befuddled. “But let me at least pay for—”

    
“It's my gift to you!”

    
Arthur stepped back, eyes wide. “If you put it that way, all right. I shall remember you for this kindness.”

    
“No! Don't remember me. Forget you ever saw me!” His fists were clenching and unclenching.

    
Quigley took Arthur by the elbow. “I think you'd better go, sir. He gets like this when things go a little … wrong.”

    
“Well,” said Arthur, buttoning his coat. “That's the true mark of a man. To be able to take minor variances in routine in stride. He could stand a bit of work on that score.”

    
“Yes, sir.”

    
“You be certain to tell him that.”

    
“I will, sir,” Quigley assured him, bobbing his head obediently.

    
“When he stops crying, that is.”

    
“Yes, sir.”

    
He walked over to Sidney, who cringed slightly back
from him, and extended a hand. Sidney looked at it as if it was the hand of a leper.

    
“In my time … that is to say, in the old days,” Arthur said softly, “we proferred hands in order to show that we carried no weapons. It was considered a very suspicious sign when one person would refuse to present his hand to the other for inspection.”

    
Sidney immediately grabbed Arthur's hand. Arthur shook it firmly …

    
… and for no reason that Sidney could readily discern, he felt ... at peace. As if merely clasping the man's hand was more than enough to assure him that everything— the world, his life, everything—was going to be just fine.

    
“Take heart,” Arthur told him. “I've returned … and everything is going to be all right.”

    
“That's ...” Sidney drew an unsteady breath. “That's … good to hear.”

    
“Yes. I imagine it would be.” He released his hand, patted Sidney on the shoulder, and said, “Good evening to you, then.”

    
“Good evening, sir.”

    
Arthur turned and walked out of the store, stepping delicately over the broken glass. Sidney watched him go and then, after a long pause, turned to Quigley and said, “We're going to get this cleaned up, report a break in, and when all that is attended to … then we're going to go out and get drunk. How does that sound to you, Quigley?”

    
“Like a plan,” Quigley said with certainty, and he went to get a broom. He noticed the mace lying on the floor, picked it up, and put it behind the counter. Wouldn't hurt to keep it around; there were all sorts of weirdos walking the streets these days.

C
HAPTRE

T
HE
T
HIRD

A
RTHUR SHOOK HIS
head in wonderment, tilting back leisurely on his heels so that his gaze could follow to the tops of buildings that caressed the skies. He felt mixed emotions: On the one hand, they seemed heartless and cold. There was no style or design to them, really. There were some minor variations, but for the most part it was just tall building after tall building. Not even a decent gargoyle in sight. On the other hand, the sheer height and immensity of them were enough to take his breath away. It led him to conclude that modern man was incapable of doing anything with genuine flair, but was able to turn out rubbish in staggeringly impressive fashion.

    
It was a cloudless night, with more than a considerable nip in the air. Arthur hardly noticed, so captivated was he by the sheer enormity of the city around him. And the thing he found more staggering than anything else was that the evening's pedestrians seemed to be utterly oblivious to the wonderment all about them. No one looked up to admire the architecture or whistle at a building
height that, in Arthur's time, would have been considered a fantasy. If Arthur were able to go back to his own time, he could have assembled a hundred architects of the period—all great and learned men—presented them with drawings of what he was beholding, and been assured by every single one of them that it was simply physically impossible. That any building that tall would topple over, a victim of its own pretensions. They would have dismissed the drawings as a pleasant fantasy, nothing more.

    
“How things change,” he murmured. “Now these buildings are the reality, and it is I who have become the fantasy.”

    
He jammed his hands deep into his coat pockets. He had kept only one piece of his previous ensemble with him: The scabbard. He felt the comforting shape of the empty scabbard through the cloth. Only the tip was visible, peeping out every so often from the long coat, and Arthur was certain that no one could possibly spot—

    
There was a gentle tap on his shoulder, and he turned to look up—gods above, why was everyone so bloody tall?—into the face of a middle-aged, uniformed man, whom Arthur promptly and correctly took to be a police officer. He was sizing up Arthur with a gaze perfected over years of staying alive when, in his uniform, he was a walking target. He said, “Excuse me. Might I ask you what you're wearing under that coat?”

    
Arthur smiled politely. “Certainly. It's a scabbard.”

    
“Ah.” The cop smiled thinly. “Are you aware of the laws, buddy, against carrying a concealed weapon?”

    
Arthur's voice abruptly turned chilly as the evening air. He was, after all, still a king, and there were certain tones of voice that he simply was not going to tolerate. He had suffered enough ignominy this evening, and this latest assault on his self-esteem was simply unwarranted. “I am aware of a great many things—” and he glanced at the officer's name badge, “Officer Owens, the main of which
is that I do not appreciate your tone of voice, nor shall I endure being addressed in that manner.”

    
The police officer set his jaw. “You know what they call me back at the precinct house, buddy? Iron-Spine Owens. Because I never backed down from anyone in my life, and I—”

    
Arthur wasn't hearing it. “And do you know what they do
not
call me?” His voice never rose in volume, but it did in intensity. “They do not call me buddy, pal, friend, chum, or old sock. They treat me with the respect that I am due, and you will extend the same courtesy. Is that clear?” Without waiting for Owens to reply, he repeated,
“Is that clear?”

    
Owens locked gazes with Arthur for a moment, but only for a moment, and then he dropped his stare and— sounding for all the world like a recalcitrant child—he said softly, “Sorry, sir. But—”

    
Arthur, with no letup, continued, “For your further information and, if you insist, for your peace of mind, the scabbard is empty. There is no sword in it, and therefore no need to concern oneself with concealed weapons. And I might add that if mankind had not worked so hard to perfect weaponry that any fool could hide in a pocket and use to launch a cowardly assault from yards away, with no more skill or finesse than a diseased crow, then we wouldn't have a need for quite so many laws about concealed weapons.” He shook his head. “Most insane bloody process I've ever seen. Create the weapons, then legislate against them. It doesn't stop in New York, you know. It pervades society. Create nuclear weapons, and then try to stop them from being used. The moment they used the first one they should have stopped when they saw what they had on their hands. I certainly would have.”

    
“Well, sir,” said Owens contritely, “it's a shame you weren't around then.”

    
“Oh, I was. But hardly in a position to do anything.” He sighed. “Hopefully I shall remedy that now.”

    
Owens looked at him with unrestrained curiosity. “Pardon my asking sir, but … are you a politician or something?”

    
Arthur reflected a moment and then said, “I'd have to say I fall under the category of ‘or something.' Why, do I come across to you as such?”

    
“Well, sort of. Except you sure have the rest of them out-classed. You got a way with a phrase. Let me tell you, if you ever run for public office, you'll have my vote.”

    
“Really?” Arthur was most intrigued. Considering that, only moments before, the man had been harassing him, he had done a considerable turnaround in an extremely brief time. “On what basis?”

    
“Basis?” Iron-Spine Owens laughed out loud, coarsely. “You don't need a ‘basis' to vote for people anymore. You vote for the guy who looks good or sounds good. It's not about messages. It's about sound bytes and guys who seem normal, likable. Most of the time it's just a matter of voting for the guy who's the least idiotic. Anyone who enters politics has to be an idiot anyway. Just look less like an idiot than the other guy and you'll win whatever office you're running for.”

    
“That is … very interesting. Well … good evening to you, then.”

    
Owens touched the brim of his cap with his finger. “Evening to you, too, sir. Oh, sir … you weren't thinking of heading into the park, were you?”

    
Arthur looked across Fifty-ninth Street to the edge of Central Park. There were a few stray couples walking arm-in-arm along the sidewalk running around the park, but no one was actually entering it.

    
“That had, in fact, been my intention, yes. Why? Is there some reason I should not?”

    
Owens rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “Well … most of the time it's safe enough. Sure safer than it used to be. Nevertheless, I'd advise against it. Unless you have a way of occupying that scabbard of yours with a sword.”

    
“But if I were to carry a sword, you would then feel compelled to arrest me for it.”

    
“First rule of being a New York cop is knowing when to look the other way.”

    
“I'll remember that,” said Arthur. “Good evening to you, sir.” He watched the police officer walk off and then turned and headed into the park.