Free Deadly Quicksilver Lies by Glen Cook Page A

though. Real violence was almost nonexistent. But the pandemonium was not pretend.
    I glimpsed the woman arguing with the men. She wanted to do something. They didn’t.
    Excellent.
    A little goblin breed three feet tall scrunched himself into a ball near the door.
    Upstairs, charity apparently overcame common sense.
    I kept the show rolling. People did get hurt, but I wasn’t in a charitable mood, to put it mildly. If I stayed a nice guy, I wasn’t ever going to get out. If I didn’t get out, I’d never get the chance to crack the heads of the clowns who’d put me in.
    The big guy came around again. He bounced me around some. “They’re coming,” I told him. “And you don’t have to be so enthusiastic here.”
    He seemed scornful. I don’t know about what.
     
     

18
    I glanced at the door, then cautioned the big guy, “Take it easy. We don’t have to convince them now.” No one was near the door but the little breed. He would be sorry he had volunteered. “How many will come?”
    The big man shrugged. “Depends on how worried they are. Least eight or ten. You better watch out.” He tripped me. I tripped him back. We rolled around and punched each other. He was having a great time. “They have a policy of kicking the living shit out of troublemakers.”
    “I kind of figured that was part of the program. Hell, I’ve stopped bleeding. I’m ready for anything.” I wasn’t looking forward to the kicking part. You lays your bets and takes your chances, but I was hoping things would go well and I would not have to deal with any boots.
    You have to believe you’re going to win.
    I did have to win. Nobody knew where I was. It could be weeks before anybody even missed me, what with Dean out of town and the Dead Man sleeping. It might be weeks after that before anybody tracked me down. If anybody bothered to try.
    I didn’t have weeks. I didn’t feel I could waste the time I’d spent inside already. The Dead Man might chuckle and tell me to consider it a learning experience, which is what he does when I have a bad day.
    If I didn’t break out, it was going to be the all-time bad day to start a long string of bad days.
    The woman stayed at the observation window. I kept howling my head off and throwing people around and strangling other guys making noise.
    The thing that got me, down deep, was that almost half the guys in the ward didn’t get involved. Most of those never opened their eyes. They just laid there, indifferent.
    Man, that was scary. That could be me in twenty years if I blew this.
    Fear provided the inspiration I needed to keep howling and foaming at the mouth. I tried speaking in tongues. That came to me naturally. A little something for when I got too old to make it on the street. A good howl and roll man can start his own church.
    The door opened.
    Wonder of wonders, miracle of miracles, those dopes actually opened the door.
    It swung outward. Attendants boiled inside. They knew something was up. They were ready for bear. They had clubs and small shields. They all looked about twelve feet tall. They formed in a tight knot before they started forward.
    A few months earlier, in a moment of weakness brought on by engulfing an inland sea of beer, I’d bought some stuff from a third-rate wizard who’d called himself Dread but whose name was really Milton. You don’t never trust the skills of a wizard named Milton — as I’d learned to my sorrow on trying to use one of his charms. His stuff came with a warranty, but he wasn’t around to make good on it.
    In my pockets were several tiny bottles, the last of my purchase. According to Dread, they constituted the ideal means of dealing with unfriendly crowds. I didn’t know, never having tested them. I wasn’t sure I even recalled Dread’s instructions. It was real drunk out that night.
    I told me I had another good reason for wanting out. I had to find old Milt and register a consumer complaint.
    As I recalled, all I had to do was throw a