The Enterprise of Death - Jesse Bullington [110]
“Just burns me up, seeing her on his lap, knowing what she’ll be doing before the night’s out.” Awa shook her head, teeth clenched so hard that her jaw began to ache. “That asshole!”
“Call’em Roast Beef, ya ever want ta take some of what he’s been robbin.”
“Roast Beef?”
“What the locals call them Saxons what come down all pale an’ pink up in the sun.”
“Pet insults don’t take the sting out of her kissing on him and everything else.”
“Well, she’s an earner, a true earner, an’ that’s what it takes.” Monique put her arm around Awa and gave her a tight squeeze. “Most ’ores can’t juggle private with business, but that minky pink of yours seems more’n capable. Be careful, though—a mink got teeth, don’t it?”
“What the fuck’s that supposed to mean?” said Awa, removing Monique’s arm from her shoulder and standing up. “You wouldn’t be jealous, would you, Mo?”
“Of her or you?” Monique shook her head. “That bitch is too bony for my likin, an’ too damn clever by ’alf. On occasion I’ll take a bony ’ore, or a smart one, but never the two in one. Recipe for trouble.”
Awa stared at Monique for a moment, then burst out laughing. “That’s the stupidest thing you’ve ever said. That … that makes absolutely no sense!”
“It don’t, does it?” Monique smiled. “Philosophy’s a pretty personal affair, don’t always translate. Oi, let’s get us a new bottle. I tell ya I got the shithouse fair ta sussed?”
The shithouse was Monique’s saltpeter farm, a small brick building she had built behind the brothel. She filled it with dung from the nearby stable and the contents of every chamber pot, and woe to the ear of the whore who dumped her pot in the street instead of the special gutter draining into the shithouse. The gunner had endeavored to get Awa to assist in managing the balance of excrement, urine, and other elements to ensure the proper conditions were maintained, but the necromancer would have none of it, insisting that such esoteric matters were more the forte of Paracelsus than she. Eventually Monique got it sorted well enough on her own, and after she had separated—and sold off—the table salt from the mineral deposits that grew in the shithouse, she mixed the resulting saltpeter with willow charcoal and sulfur in her room, and had started bringing in almost more money from the blackpowder she sold than from the whores. Never in her life had Monique been happier.
They sat up most of the night drinking and talking, both realizing it had been far too long since they had simply relaxed together and shared a drink, and both realizing how much they missed it. Neither woman let the whores—regular visitors to their beds or not—in on their secrets or their pasts, and being with another individual who knew more about both than either were necessarily comfortable with felt liberating, and they had a proper night of it. When a soft knock came around the end of the second bottle Awa wasn’t sure she entirely wanted to leave the company of the Dutch gunner, but Monique shooed her off after making a lewd innuendo or two, and Chloé helped her drunk lover up to the attic. Awa tried to go straight to sleep but Chloé made her drink some water, and as she did the whore apologized.
“He’s harmless, just an idiot, really—I’ve never met anyone so conceited and stupid.”
“Gotta do what you gotta,” said Awa, no longer as annoyed as she would have liked.
“He’s just a mark,” said Chloé. “Nothing more’n a pisstaker.”
“Eh?” Awa heaved herself back out of bed, reminded to relieve herself before passing out. “Who said he was more than that?”
“He’s not … he’s really not so bad,” said Chloé, so quietly Awa could barely hear her over the sound of piss hitting the chamber pot.
“What are you sayin?” Awa clambered back into bed. “I don’t want to hear about his fucking style.”
“What? How much did you drink?”
“A lot.”
“Oh. No, like … like as far as they go, he thinks he’s funny, sure, but he’s harmless. I talked to him, told’em I’d cut him off, he talked that way to you again.”
“Don’t go missing out on wages on account of my fucking sensitivity to loudmouthed assholes,