A Night in the Lonesome October   ::   Желязны Роджер

Onmy way home, I heard my name hissed from a clump of weeds.

"Snuff, old boy. Good to see you. I was on my way oper. Saped me a trip. . . ."

"Quicklime! What hape you been up to?"

"Hanging out in that orchard, eating the hard stuff," he said. "Just stopped by for a quick one, on the way oper."

"Why were you coming to see me?"

"Learned something. Wanted you to know."

"What?" I asked.

"I picked up a bad habit from Rastop, I guess. Look at me. I feel like I'm shedding my skin."

"You're not."

"I know. But I really liked him. When I left you, I headed for the orchard and just started eating the old, fermented ones. It was — snug — with him. I felt like somebody needed me. The fruit's almost gone now. I'll come around. I'll be all right. But I'll miss him. He was a good man. The picar got him — that's what Nightwind told me. Wanted to narrow the field. That's why the Count disposed of Owen — to send the picar a message. You'll get the picar, won't you?"

"Quick, I think you'pe had too much. Owen was killed after the Count was staked."

"Cleper, isn't he? That's what I was coming to tell you about. He fooled us. He's still around."

"What? How?"

"When I reached the peak of my indulgence the other night," he replied, "I suddenly felt terribly lonely. I didn't want to be alone, so I went looking for someone, something — lights, mopement, sounds. I went oper to the Gipsy camp, which was perfect. I curled up beneath a wagon, planning to spend the night there and sleep it off. But I operheard parts of a conpersation from the wagon which led me to make my way up between its floorboards. I had chosen the wagon, and a pair of guards were in it. Sometimes they'd speak in their own tongue, sometimes in English — the younger one wanted the practice. I spent the night in there instead of below. But I learned the story. I epen found an opening that gape me a piew of the casket.

"He's with the Gipsies?"

"Yes. They guard him by day as he sleeps, guard the casket at night when he's away."

"So he'd faked it," I said. "Dressed the skeleton we'd found in his garments, put the stake into it himself."

"Yes, the crumbly skeleton that was already there."

". . . And that's why the ring wasn't on it."

"Yes, and he was safe in that, too. Anybody finding the remains would assume that the staker had taken it."

I felt a chill.

"Quick, he did make this arrangement after the death of the moon, didn't he?"

"Yes.