The Folding Knife (64 page)

Motion carried unanimously.

"You should have gone to the House," she said.

Basso shook his head. "Not likely," he replied, stuffing two shirts into his bag. "They wouldn't have let me leave."

"You're going, then."

"I think so, yes," Basso replied. "Probably a good idea if I cleared out for a while." He pulled open his desk drawer and pocketed a few things. "Is there any cash money in the house?"

"Sorry," she said. "I just did the month's shopping."

"Oh." He scowled. "How much?"

"Eight nomismata and some change."

He sighed. "That'll have to do, then." She brought him the money. He put the silver in his pocket and wedged the gold into the toes of his boots. "Pity about that," he said. "Dropping by the Bank and making a withdrawal probably wouldn't be a good idea right now."

"You can have my jewellery," she said. "That must be worth a good deal."

"Keep it," he replied, "you'll need it. Might be an idea to pack a bag of your own. Unless..." He paused, a shoe in each hand. "Unless you feel like coming with me."

She frowned. "All right," she said. "If you want me to."

"Thanks." He wasn't looking at her. "In that case, grab anything you've got that's gold or silver and won't weigh you down." He lifted his head and grinned at her. "I've never had to do this before," he said. "But I know plenty of people who have. I gather the main thing is small items of great value, and keep them out of sight."

She took a pillow off the bed, peeled off the pillowcase and started filling it with clothes, shoes and the contents of her jewellery boxes. "I really wish I'd bought you more gaudy and expensive presents," he said. "A diamond tiara or two would come in really handy right now."

"I never cared for diamonds," she replied. "How about some of your books? Aren't they rather valuable?"

Basso nodded. "But not safe to sell," he said. "My own stupid fault, for having the covers monogrammed. Could cut the covers off, I suppose, but it'd still be too risky. Besides, too bulky. Never carry anything that might slow you down if you have to run."

She'd finished filling her pillowcase. "You could stay," she said.

"What, and fight my corner?" He laughed. "No thanks. My life may have turned to shit, but I'm in no hurry to be rid of it quite yet. And if you're coming with me..." He frowned. "Anyway," he said, "that's going to have to do." He emptied his silver inkwell on the floor, wiped it out with the corner of a tablecloth and dropped it in his pocket. "Time to go," he said.

On the way out, he propped a letter on the small marble-topped table where visitors were encouraged to leave their hats and gloves. He doubted very much that it would reach his sister, but he knew he had to make the effort.

It read:

I know. I killed your husband, and now I've killed your son.

I love you more than anyone else in the world, now that Bassano's gone. I know. I've got a bloody funny way of showing it.

I have no excuses, nothing left to say except, I'm sorry. I loved him so much, and my love killed him. You were right about me all along. It'd have been so much better for everybody in the world if I'd never been born.

Basso

* * *

The guards were a problem. They still had their orders: the First Citizen wasn't supposed to leave his house without a full escort. Basso tried sending them away, gave them a direct order; the sergeant mumbled something about the chain of command and looked away. Basso went back inside.

"How do you feel about climbing out of windows?" he asked her.

"Depends."

He couldn't remember if he'd told them how he'd escaped, the night Bassano went away. But he couldn't have; straight out into the street with no problems. "Pretend we're having an argument," he told her. "People tend to look away when they see married couples arguing in public."

She nodded crisply, then launched into a loud and bitter tirade about how he'd spent the rent money at the dog races. He looked away and quickened his pace; she was trotting along behind him, calling him names. As far as the people they passed were concerned, they were invisible.

In an alley off the Portway, they stopped to plan their next move. "We can forget about a ship," Basso said. "You can bet anything you like there'll be a crowd down at the docks, offering silly money for three square feet of deck space. We can't afford what the captains'll be asking."

She nodded. "What about jewellery?" she said.

He thought for a moment. "Keep it," he said. "This isn't a time for extravagance."

"So what do you propose?"

"We walk out," Basso replied. "The Westgate, for choice. There'll be crowds on the road we can hide in."

"Will the gates be watched, do you think?"

He shrugged. "For all I know, I'm still First Citizen," he replied. "Besides, they won't be expecting me to run just yet. They assume I'll stay and fight, since I've got so much to lose. Hence the need to hurry."

"Are you sure?" she asked him. "About running, I mean. You're assuming every man's hand's against you, but..."

He shook his head. "If it was just the Bank going under and the defeat, I might stick it out. But the Empire's coming. I really don't want to be here when they arrive."

She nodded; fair point. "So," she said, "once we're out through the gate."

He frowned. "I haven't thought that far ahead, to be honest," he said. "One place is pretty much like another. So long as it's somewhere they won't expect us to go, and where I'm not known."

"Is there anywhere?"

"Must be," he said. "Ready?"

There was a huge crowd in Portway Square, where all the banks had their offices--hundreds and thousands laying siege to the closed doors, and nobody even trying to restore order. It was so long since a Vesani bank had failed, nobody knew what to do any more. The general consensus seemed to be to break down the doors and get inside, but there was no method or organisation. No looting of shops as yet; at least, not in the centre of town. They couldn't call out the Guard, of course. The City division had been sent to Mavortis, and there were only half a dozen platoons left.

"What do you think the Empire will do?" she asked.

He shrugged. "Nothing too drastic, I hope," he replied. "I don't think they'll burn the place down or allow the soldiers to loot. After all, as far as they're concerned it's their property, they won't want it damaged."

"And the people?"

"Also their property. Dead men and beggars can't pay taxes."

At the junction of Coppermarket and Long Lane there was some kind of hold-up. The people in front of them were trying to get through, but couldn't. Basso and Melsuntha elbowed their way to the front of the crowd, and saw that two coaches had met head-on in Coppergate, unable to pass each other because of the streams of pedestrians, and now both streets were comprehensively jammed. One of the coaches was the City mail; he recognised the other.

"My sister," he said. "On her way to call on me, I imagine."

Melsuntha looked at him. "She can't have got your letter already," she said.

"Not with all this traffic," Basso said. "Presumably she wanted to have a final yell at me, before the guards arrive to take me away." He shook his head. "I love her dearly, but she's always had a fatal weakness for making scenes, and if there's one thing I can't be doing with, it's melodrama."

Melsuntha was pulling on his sleeve. "We don't want her seeing us," she said.

"That's all right," Basso replied. "She never looks out of coach windows. She gets travel-sick. Come on," he said, "we'll cut through the Poultry and come out on Long Lane further up."

By the time they came in sight of the walls, the streets were hopelessly clogged with carts and wagons, all ridiculously overladen with people, furniture, sacks, crates and boxes. Children and young lads were darting along the immobilised rows, snatching anything they could reach; their victims didn't dare get down off the carts to chase them, for fear of losing their places. Nobody was making any attempt to direct or unsnarl traffic; not a guard to be seen anywhere.

"The hell with this," Basso said. "We should cut across town to the Southgate. There won't be so many people there."

But the Southgate was just as bad; Southgate Street and the Linen Yard were irrevocably clogged with carts, and the watergate was firmly shut. "This is starting to get on my nerves," Basso said. "Let's get off the street for a while and see if things calm down."

They went to the Memory of Heroes, a big inn on the outskirts of the cattle-market. It was empty, apart from a handful of the sort of men who never really left. Basso went to the bar and asked for a pint of rough cider; two bits.

"Here, I know you," said a man at the bar.

"I doubt it," Basso said, trying not to sound nervous.

"I do know you." The man was scowling horribly at him. "You're him, aren't you? The big boss."

Basso put his glass down, so his hands were free. "Think about it," he said. "If I was the First Citizen, would I be in a place like this?"

But the man's mind was made up. "You are him," he said. "I know your face, off the money. I got a bone to pick with you."

Basso tried to see over the top of his head. Luckily, the man was the sort nobody ever listened to. "All right," he said quietly. "Just for the sake of argument, I'm Bassianus Severus. What about it?"

"You owe me."

Oh well, Basso thought, and looked for an escape route, once he'd smashed the glass in the man's face. But the man was still talking.

"You don't know me, do you?"

"Sorry, no."

"I'm Bevennius," the man said. "Bevennius the barber. It was me told your General Aelius about the stolen money. Well? Remember me now?"

"Vaguely."

The man nodded firmly: vindicated, before the whole world. "I was supposed to have a pension for life," he said. "It was decreed by the government."

"I remember," Basso said. "So?"

"They won't fucking pay me," the man said furiously. "Went down the paymasters' to collect, they told me to piss off. No money left, they said, which is bullshit. Course the government's got money. But they said no, no money; if I want my pension, they said I should go and ask the bloody First Citizen. So that's what I'm doing," the man went on. "I want my money."

Basso grinned at him. "Very sorry," he said. "I can't give you anything. I'm broke."

"Bullshit."

"Believe me," Basso said, with a great big smile. "You go out in the street, you can see the queues outside the Bank. I spent my last coppers buying this drink."

The man frowned. "Is that true?"

"Yes."

"Oh. Fuck you, then," he said, and walked away.

The traffic didn't clear; if anything, it was getting worse. At noon every day, four hundred carts brought fresh vegetables into the City from the farms and market gardens outside the walls--four hundred carts trying to get in, three times as many trying to get out, and all wanting to pass under the same four archways. The crowd of people on foot who were also desperate to get out of town finally lost their patience and swarmed up onto the carts, picking their way none too lightly over the heaped-up luggage and the passengers. Basso and Melsuntha joined the stumbling, hopping stream. It took a long time.

An inbound carter asked: "What's going on?"

"The City's gone bust," Basso told him. "No money."

The carter stared at him, then past him, ignoring his existence. The City couldn't go bust; there had to be money. Basso jumped down off the cart, then helped Melsuntha. They were out. People were swirling past them, arms full of bundles and baskets. I did this, Basso thought.

They walked for an hour, by which time the crowd had thinned; then they stopped and sat under a tree. "Decided where we're going yet?" she asked him.

"Hardly matters," he replied. "Our chances of being able to buy food within ten miles of the city are pretty slim. As for sleeping in a bed or under a roof, forget it." He thought for a while, then said: "North, I suppose. Keep going till we're the only ones on the road."

"I brought some biscuits," she said.

He raised his eyebrows. "Biscuits?"

"All I could find," she said. "I think the servants must've looted the kitchen before they left."

"Biscuits will do just fine." He took one, then said, "We'd better ration them. God only knows when we'll find anywhere with any food to sell."

He looked around for the first time, interested in where he was. The country had never interested him--too few people, too few things, nothing going on. He looked back up the dusty road. In the distance, he could just make out the City, on the fold between the sea and the sky.

"Maybe I should've stayed," he said.

"They'd have lynched you."

"Yes," he said. "But out here there's nothing."

"Have you decided where you're going to go yet?"

He looked back the other way. The road was a faint grey scar on the brown hillside. To the north, there was nothing but moor for a hundred miles. Then you came to the border. Beyond that, the land rose slowly, until you came to the desert of coarse grass that stretched away practically for ever. The Hus lived there, somewhere.