“Harvester Temisk?”

“That’s the one.”

“So Mr. Temisk was there. Early. In the back.” I hadn’t known that. Nobody had mentioned seeing Temisk.

“Where I first run into him was in the pantries. I don’t know why he was back there. Looking for lamp oil, he said. Since I seen some in the kitchen, brung by the fancy boys, I showed him where I seen it.”

“What about Miss Contague? When did she show?”

Mrs. Claxton confirmed my suspicions. “She was already there when I got there. With her bodyguards. Checking for trouble, I guess.”

“Mr. Temisk wanted lamp oil? Why?”

“Well, he took out this little wood box and shook this green, flaky stuff in the oil and shook the jars. He said it was incense. He had me fill the lamps to go on the tables.”

This didn’t look good for Harvester Temisk. “Then what?”

“I don’t know. Then he went away. I didn’t see him again. I worked around the kitchen. Oh. And Mr.Temisk gave me this little jade pin. For being so helpful, he said.“

Didn’t look good for Temisk at all. “This flake stuff. Did any get spilled? Or miss getting into the lamp oil?” If it was what I suspected, it got tracked around by an unwitting rat.

Mrs. Claxton considered. “Come to think, he did fumble the lid of the box when he started to spice up the first oil jar. He cussed something awful. Because the spice was so expensive, he said.”

Yes. No doubt. We talked a while, mainly about her sad family. I didn’t learn anything useful. “Did anyone else see Mr. Temisk?”

“I don’t know. I never seen no one else around.”

“Did you see the lady’s father? Chodo Contague?”

“Well, no. But he musta been there somewhere, eh?”

Temisk’s timing had been amazing if he’d been missed by my pixies and rats. Although there hadn’t been any reason for them to watch for him and no reason for them to recognize him if they did see him. A guy named Garrett was the only one who needed to miss him. Plus Chodo’s beloved only child and a few underbosses, the latter of whom had no reason to visit the kitchens.

This was beginning to look like a huge, ugly Harvester Temisk murder scheme piggybacked onto whatever plot Belinda was running. Which meant that Temisk used me from the start.

Everybody’s schemes disintegrated in the chaos inside Whitefield Hall.

I’d have some hard questions for lawyer boy when I caught him.

“Thank you, Mrs. Claxton. Do you want me to check on your family?”

“Thank you, young man, but no. I’ll handle them myself. I will get out of here someday.”

“I hope so. You keep that attitude, it won’t be long.”

Morley was reluctant to leave. His new friend was loath to let him go. But other people were arriving for work. Being people, they were nosy, noisy, and demanding.

“You learn anything?” I asked as we slipped outside. And, “Where the hell did those two go?”

Singe and Saucerhead were nowhere to be seen.

“A trust fund pays for the guards. There’s Tharpe.”

Saucerhead beckoned from a gap between buildings where overhangs provided some protection from the drizzle.

“Is it worth chasing the money trail?”

“Why bother? Unless you’ve got something going that I don’t know about. Block and Relway might give it a look, though.”

“I’ve got a feeling they’ve lost interest in the Ugly Pants Gang. For now. What’re you guys doing over here?”

“Trying not to be noticed by Plenty Hart and Bobo Negry,” Saucerhead said.

“Who?”

“A couple of Rory’s men,” Morley told me. “Middle level. Dangerous. What would they be doing here?”

“Maybe Merry is inside,” I speculated. “He was in ragged shape when the Dead Man was done with him.”

“Maybe.” Tharpe doubted it, though. “They was looking for somebody.”

“Us? Did Big Boy not do a good job of getting us away?”

Tharpe shrugged.

“Singe?”

“Do not ask me. I am a tracker. I can help you find an answer only by tracking those men back. If they came here on our trail, that would be obvious in a short time. Do you wish to try that?”

“Would it take long to make sure?”

“Ten minutes,” Singe promised.

“Saucerhead, stick with her. Soon as she makes up her mind, head for… where, Singe?”

“The Tersize Granary.”

“Sniff Morley and me out, Singe.”

“Or Garrett and I,” Dotes said. Then, once they took off, “You planning on rushing into this?”

“You have a suggestion?”

“Same old, same old as always. Be ready for trouble.”

He meant weaponry. Armaments, in fact. He’d lug a siege ballista if he could get one into a pocket. And use it at the least excuse. And feel no remorse afterward.

“I have my stick.”

Morley was not overawed.

“If I need something nastier, I’ll take it away from somebody.”

“You’re not as young and quick as you think you are.”

“Is anybody? Ever?”

“So stipulated. Without excusing your silly refusal to look out for yourself.”

“Oh-oh. I get the feeling my weapons habits are about to take second place to my dietary habits.”

“Since you bring it up…”

And so it went. Thirty minutes later we sighted the Tersize Granary. Which, till recently, had been the Royal Karentine Military Granary, whence vast tonnages of feed grains, flours, and finished baked goods (read rock-hard hardtack in hundredweight barrels) barged down a canal to the river and thence to the war zone. The operating Tersize family acquired it from the Ministry of War, cheap after the killing stopped.

I said, “The Tersizes are related to the Contagues somehow, aren’t they?”

“Chodo’s stepsister Cloris married Misias Tersize. But they weren’t in bed with the Outfit. That I’ve heard. The place isn’t what it used to be,” Morley said of the sprawl of redbrick milling and storage facilities.

Much of it appeared to have gone derelict. “You know this area?” I didn’t. “I don’t see any sign of squatters.” TunFaire is inundated with refugees from a war zone that no longer exists.

“No. The place used to be a fort. The millers and bakers couldn’t get in or out without a military pass. You want to wait for Saucerhead and Singe?”

Recalling times when I’d just charged in, “I think so.”

“Developing a taste for caution? At this late date?”

“I have responsibilities now. Dean. The Dead Man. Seven kittens. And a girlfriend who’ll hunt me down in Hell if I get myself killed before I can visit her in her sickbed.”

“Why don’t we just slip into the lee of one of these buildings while we wait, then? Because I’ve just figured out why there aren’t any squatters.”

I caught what his sharper elfish eyes had spied already.

Three sizable men ambled along the street beside the westernmost wall of the granary. One checked the doors that existed at regular intervals, formerly for loading and unloading. The street-side walls of the granary were the outer faces of the various structures included in the complex, connected by the outer faces of single-story sheds. Tinnie’s family lived in a similar complex. It included family housing, worker housing, warehousing, and manufacturing workshops. The Tate compound, though, had a smaller footprint and was less imposing vertically.

“You know, brunos look pretty much the same wherever you find them. But I have a definite feeling that these three wouldn’t be embarrassed if their mothers dressed them in green plaid pants.” Had Block cut them loose? Or were there more of them than suspected, now avoiding the Bledsoe project and public attention?

The door checker of the three performed his function again, using a stick much like the one I carried. The others were better armed. Or worse, if you have a tendency to acknowledge the law. One carried a set of swords, long and short. The other lugged a siege engine of a crossbow, drawn and loaded. They were looking for trouble.