Free Steampunk!: An Anthology of Fantastically Rich and Strange Stories by Kelly Link Page B

to swill the brandy and laugh and spray a boozy cloud before him.
    Once we were all standing in our nightshirts and underclothes, every scar and stump on display, he let off his ringing and cleared his throat ostentatiously, then stepped nimbly onto one of the chairs, wobbling for an instant on his steel peg, then leaped again, like a goat leaping from rock to rock, up onto the table, sending my carefully laid cutlery clattering every which-a-way.
    He cleared his throat again, and said, "Good morrow, to you, good morrow, all, good morrow to the poor, crippled, abused children of Saint Aggie's. We haven't been properly introduced, so I thought it fitting that I should take a moment to greet you all and share a bit of good news with you. My name is Montreal Monty Goldfarb, machinist's boy, prentice artificer, gentleman adventurer, and liberator of the oppressed. I am late foreshortened"—he waggled his stumps—"as are so many of you. And yet, and yet, I say to you, I am as good a man as I was ere I lost my limbs, and I say that you are, too." There was a cautious murmur at this. It was the kind of thing the sisters said to you in the hospital, before they brought you to Saint Aggie's, the kind of pretty lies they told you about the wonderful life that awaited you with your new, crippled body, once you had been retrained and put to productive work.
    "Children of Saint Aggie's, hearken to old Montreal Monty, and I will tell you of what is possible and what is necessary. First, what is necessary: to end oppression wherever we find it, to be liberators of the downtrodden and the meek. When that evil dog's pizzle flogged me and threw me in his dungeon, I knew that I'd come upon a bully, a man who poisoned the sweet air with each breath of his cursed lungs, and so I resolved to do something about it. And so I have." He clattered the table's length, to where Grinder's body slumped. Many of the children had been so fixated on the odd spectacle that Monty presented that they hadn't even noticed the extraordinary sight of our tormentor sat, apparently sleeping or unconscious. With the air of a magician, Monty bent and took the end of the tea towel and gave it a sharp yank, so that all could see the knife handle protruding from the red stain that covered Grinder's chest. We gasped, and some of the more fainthearted children shrieked, but no one ran off to get the law, and no one wept a single salty tear for our dead benefactor.
    Monty held his arms over his head in a wide V and looked expectantly upon us. It only took a moment before someone—perhaps it was me — began to applaud, to cheer, to stomp, and then we were all at it, making such a noise as you might encounter in a tavern full of men who've just learned that their side has won a war. Monty waited for it to die down a bit, and then, with a theatrical flourish, he pushed Grinder out of his chair, letting him slide to the floor with a meaty thump, and settled himself into the chair the corpse had lately sat upon. The message was clear: I am now the master of this house.
    I cleared my throat and raised my good arm. I'd had more time than the rest of the Saint Aggie's children to consider life without the terrible Grinder, and a thought had come to me. Monty nodded regally at me, and I found myself standing with every eye in the room upon me.
    "Monty," I said, "on behalf of the children of Saint Aggie's, I thank you most sincerely for doing away with cruel old Grinder, but I must ask you, what shall we do now? With Grinder gone, the sisters will surely shut down Saint Aggie's, or perhaps send us another vile old master to beat us, and you shall go to the gallows at the King Street Gaol, and, well, it just seems like a pity that . . ." I waved my stump. "It just seems a pity, is what I'm saying."
    Monty nodded again. "Sian, I thank you, for you have come neatly to my next point. I spoke of what was needed and what was possible, and now we must discuss what is possible. I had a nice