The Last Ring-bearer - Kirill Yeskov [130]
It is hard to say what attracted the DSD Vice-Director's attention to this banal harbor story; perhaps some faint premonition. As far as he remembered, Uncle Sarrakesh was connected to Lame Vittano's zamorro and specialized in smuggling proscribed steel weaponry to Harad in exchange for cola nuts whose import was the Republic's monopoly. Cola was very expensive stuff, so the return shipments were typically small (no more than ten grain sacks) and it was a task of two or three minutes to heave them overboard in case of trouble, so the emptiness of the Flying Fish's hold did not surprise the Vice-Director. The strange thing was that the guardsmen's specially trained dog had not detected any cola smell on board, which prompted him to give his full attention to the idea that the felucca's only cargo had been an unknown passenger. At any other time this would have been a trifle – but not now, when the Department was carefully cutting off all of the 12 Shore Street's possible communication channels and looking for Gondorian illegals from Mongoose's team. Jacuzzi decided that any leniency was inappropriate at that crucial juncture and ordered a vigorous interrogation of the captured smugglers. A couple of hours later one of Sarrakesh's 'nephews' broke down and described their escaped passenger; Jacuzzi had no trouble recognizing Baron Tangorn from the description.
Upon such recognition he cursed, shortly but colorfully, like a sailor, as he realized that he could not get to Tangorn any time soon. Sarrakesh was from the Peninsula; undoubtedly he sent Tangorn to his relatives in one of the mountain villages. Even if Jacuzzi found out exactly which one (which would be very tough), it would not do him any good – the mountain men never surrender a fugitive to the police. To them, the law of hospitality is sacred and inviolate, and there can be no negotiation on that point; to arrest Tangorn by force he would need a minor army operation, rather than a couple of gendarmes, which no one would authorize. Send nin'yokve assassins to the mountains? That would work as an extreme measure, but… All right, let's risk a little wait until the baron tries to get back to the Islands – he did try to get straight into the Kharmian Bay last night despite an obvious danger. For a while he has no contact with Vittano's smugglers, so the sea route is closed to him, whereas to seal off the Long Dam is easy as pie.
"Find me everything we have on Uncle Sarrakesh's relatives and friends," the Vice-Director ordered his assistant. "I doubt he has a separate dossier, so you'll have to comb all the materials on Lame Vittano's zamorro. Now: who's in charge of agents among the Peninsula's mountain men – Ras-shua, was it?"
Chapter 48
Umbar Peninsula, near Iguatalpa Village
June 24, 3019
The chestnut tree in whose shade they camped was at least two hundred years old. All by themselves, its roots were holding together a huge chunk of the slope above the path leading from Iguatalpa to the pass, and doing it well: the spring rains, unusually heavy this year, have not left any landslides or fresh holes in it. From time to time a breeze rustled the luxurious crown of leaves, and then sunspots would drop silently through it down on the yellowish-cream fallen foliage that had accumulated at the foot of the trunk between the mighty roots. Tangorn stretched pleasurably