The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters

it. “My father died when I was much younger—”
    “And your uncle of course. Did you see
his
body?”
    “I did not. I have not yet—I will of course—at the funeral.”
    “You grow used to it like anything. Ask any doctor, or soldier.” Svenson heard more sounds of pouring. “All right, what’s after corpses…what about women?”
    “Beg pardon?”
    The man chuckled. “Oh, don’t be such a boiled trout—no wonder Crabbé favors you. You’re not married?”
    “No.”
    “Engaged?”
    “No.” The voice hesitated. “There was—but no, never so significant an attachment. As I say, all of these changes have come quickly—”
    “Brothels, then, I assume? Or schoolgirls?”
    “No, no,” Bascombe said, with a professionally patient tone that Svenson recognized as the hallmark of a skilled courtier, “as I say, my own feelings have always, well, always been in service to obligation—”
    “My goodness—so it’s boys?”
    “Mr. Xonck!” snapped the voice, perhaps less appalled than exasperated.
    “I am merely asking. Besides, when you’ve traveled as much as I have, things stop surprising you. In Vienna for example, there is a prison you may visit for a small fee, as one would visit a zoo, you know—but for only a few more silver
pfennigs
—”
    “But, Mr. Xonck, surely—I beg your pardon—our present business—”
    “Didn’t the Process teach you anything?”
    Here the younger man paused, taking in that this might be a more serious question than the bantering tone implied.
    “Of course,” he said, “it was
transforming
—”
    “Then have some more wine.”
    Had this been the right answer? Svenson heard the gurgling bottle as Francis Xonck began to hold forth. “Moral perspective is what we carry around with us—it exists nowhere else, I can promise you. Do you see? There is liberation and responsibility—for what is natural depends on where you are, Bascombe. Moreover, vices are like genitals—most are ugly to behold, and yet we find that our own are dear to us.” He sniggered at his own wit, drank deeply, exhaled. “But I suppose you have no vices, do you? Well, once you’ve changed your hat and become Lord Tarr, sitting on the only deposit of indigo clay within five hundred miles, I daresay you’ll find they appear soon enough—I speak from experience. Find yourself some tuppable tea cozy to marry and keep your house and then do what you want elsewhere. My brother, for example…”
    Bascombe laughed once, somewhat bitterly.
    “What is it?” asked Xonck.
    “Nothing.”
    “I do insist.”
    Bascombe sighed. “It is nothing—merely that, only last week, I was still—as I said, not
significant
—you see, one can only smile at how easy it is to believe—believe so
deeply
—”
    “Wait, wait—if you’re going to tell a
story
, then we need another bottle. Come on.”

    Their footsteps moved out of the kitchen, to the hall, and soon Svenson heard them descending the cellar stairs. He didn’t feel he could risk slipping past—he had no idea where the wine cellar actually was, or how long they would be. He could try to find the front door—but knew he was in the perfect position to learn more where he was, as long as he wasn’t discovered. Suddenly Svenson had it. Bascombe! He was Crabbé’s aide—a thin, youngish fellow, never spoke, always paying attention—he was about to be a
Lord
? Chiding himself Svenson realized he was wasting the most immediate source of information of all. He dug out another match and pushed silently through the swinging door. He listened—they were well out of hearing—struck the match and looked down at the dead man on the table.
    He was perhaps forty years old, hair thin, clean-shaven, with a sharp pointed nose. His face was covered with red blotches, vivid despite the pallor of death, lips stretched back in a grimace, revealing a mouth half-full of tobacco-stained teeth. Working quickly as the match burned, Svenson pulled back the sheet and could not help but gasp. The man’s arms, from the elbows down, were riven with veins of lurid, jagged, gleaming blue, bulging out from the skin, cutting through it. At first glance the veins looked wet, but Svenson was shocked to realize that they were in fact
glass
—and that they ran down through the man’s forearms, thickening, seething into and stiffening the flesh around them. He pulled the cloth farther and dropped the match with surprise. The man had no hands. His wrists were