The Philosophical Strangler(40)

He was still glaring at me, so I glared right back and stuck in the knife. “Or have you got some cute little philosophical angle on this I don’t know about?”

Of course, that made him furious. But I wasn’t worried. Stick it to the strangler on his philosophy, and, sure he’d get mad as a wet hen—but he wouldn’t do anything about it. Nothing physical, I mean. It was a matter of pride with Greyboar. He considered it boorish to refute a philosophical challenge with his thumbs.

So he glared at me for a full five minutes, frowning all the while in that inimitable fashion which would cause a lifetime of nightmares to any poor child which saw it. But he couldn’t think up a logical riposte, and he finally gave up trying. He nodded once, indicating his official approval of the engagement. That was all I needed. I was out of the room in a flash, down the stairs, up the street, around this corner and that, and back in The Trough. I was in a hurry because I wanted to close the deal. Once we’d taken the money for the job, Greyboar wouldn’t back out even if he did think up some idiotic philosophical objection. Professional ethics, don’t you know?

Our prospective client was still there, at the same table in the corner. The silly jackass was all scrunched up, trying to make himself as inconspicuous as possible. His eyes were flitting hither and yon, flicking fearfully over the other occupants of The Trough. Dozens of lowlifes, there were at that hour, every one of whom—not to mention all of them taken together—was a source of fear and loathing for our client. Nothing unusual about his reaction, of course. He wasn’t the first little rich kid who’d sat in that corner table, huddled and shivering with terror, while I left him to finalize the deal with Greyboar.

As soon as I sat down he started whining. “I could have had my throat cut fifty times over while you’ve been gone. You said you were only going to be a few minutes. You were gone for hours! I was alone at the mercy of these—”

“Oh, shut up,” I snarled. (One of the things I always liked about the strangling trade—you really didn’t have to fawn over your customers the way a greengrocer does.) “You were safer here than anywhere in the world. D’you think for a minute that any of the characters in this room would even think of scaring off one of Greyboar’s clients?”

I sneered. “There isn’t a cutthroat anywhere in the Flankn who’d try to come between Greyboar and a commission. Certainly not in The Trough! There’s probably more pleasant ways to commit suicide, but there’s sure none quicker.”

I let the sneer slide off after a few seconds. It’s good to put the piglets down, but you don’t want to overdo it. As the wise man says: “Pissing on ’em’s fine, but don’t drown ’em.”

“Besides,” I added, “I wasn’t gone all that long. Took me longer than usual, because Greyboar’s not happy with the job. Your great-grandfather’s been one of our steadiest clients for years. The big guy hates to let him go. In fact—”

Well, I won’t bore you with the rest. Naturally, I used Greyboar’s reluctance as my excuse to jack the fee up even higher. And, naturally, I succeeded. I wondered, sometimes, what Greyboar would have done without me as his agent. Probably been strangling crocodiles in a circus sideshow for peanuts.

I’ll give the little rat this much, he put up a good struggle. No matter how scared they are—of their surroundings and of the very idea of hiring a strangler in the first place—I never saw one of these greedy heirs apparent who’d cough up the fee without squabbling. But it didn’t bother me. The kid wasn’t a shadow of his great-grandfather when it came to haggling. And Greyboar could say what he wanted—personally, I was looking forward to getting rid of that ancient horse trader. Wouldn’t ever have to listen to him again, the venerable Monsoor Etienne Avare.

Yep, the Merchant Prince himself—our newly contracted chokee-to-be. The richest man in New Sfinctr, some said. That wasn’t actually true. There were several dukes and archbishops—not to mention the Queen—who had fortunes to make Avare’s look like a child’s piggy bank. But he was certainly the wealthiest member of the parvenu classes. And, in any event, after a while the whole point becomes moot. Even somebody as greedy and tight fisted as me thought hoards that big were ridiculous. I mean, what’s the fun of having so much money that you can’t even count it?

Quite a guy, actually, Monsieur Etienne Avare. He’d amassed a fortune as a young entrepreneur, and then kept it growing all through his later years. Even when his years got later and later and later. Over a hundred years old, he was. He’d outlived all his sons and daughters, all his grandsons and granddaughters, and was halfway through the next generation.