The Stranger - Max Frei [211]
“There you are, Juffin! Are you starting to regret that nature has rewarded you with this old crone you’re still so proud of?”
“Don’t exaggerate, my lady,” he murmured. “I still have a few tricks up my sleeve you haven’t yet learned.”
“What do I need those for? Your tricks don’t put bread on the table.” She turned to me, “How did you like that, my dear?”
I nodded in astonishment and stared at my recent captive.
“Is he alive, Lady Sotofa?”
She waved her hand with a flippant air.
“Why wouldn’t he be? I could revive him right now, but it makes more sense to do it just before you leave. I don’t intend to feed this blockhead, and if we eat while he looks on—well, it wouldn’t be very polite, would it?”
After dinner, which affected me like a dose of horse tranquilizers, Lady Sotofa leaned over the immobile body of the merchant Agon.
“How long can you just loll around like that, you no-count?” she roared in an alien, shrieking voice. The unfortunate chap began to stir.
“I’ll let you in on a little secret, Juffin,” said Sotofa, beaming. “It’s possible to return any person to life if you shout in his ear the same thing he was used to waking up to in childhood. As you see, the mother of this gentleman couldn’t control her emotions. Just like my own mother, in fact. Do you remember my mamma, Juffin, may she rest in peace? I think she was what turned us into such good sorcerers: we had to save our skins somehow. Well, collect this dolt, boys, and clear out! You have work to do, and so do we. Life’s not just for pleasure.”
We loaded the gradually reviving merchant whose life we had just saved into the amobiler. I was so taken aback by what I had seen that I didn’t even ask any questions.
“Well, what do you think of her?”
I had never known Juffin’s voice to sound so tender.
“Oh . . . I can’t even imagine what all the others are like.”
“You can take it from me that the others are no match for her. Sotofa is the cream of the crop. Even Grand Magician Nuflin is scared of her. Has this shaken your faith in me, Sir Max?”
“Not at all, but she’s really something.”
“Sotofa hails from the same place I do. Did you catch that?” Juffin smiled. “She’s my closest friend from those parts, although we see each other rarely, and mostly on official matters. About five hundred years or so ago we had a very stormy romance. The people of Kettari were tickled to death when, after the latest in a long chain of quarrels, I arrested her in the ‘name of the law’ and escorted her to the House on the Road. That’s what the local Ministry of Perfect Public Order is called. Five hundred years ago, can you believe it? Then Sotofa got it into her head that she had to enter some Order, and she tripped off to the capital. I was devastated by her little escapade. But life proved the girl right—there was a place in the Order for her.”
I stared at Juffin.
“Are you telling me this for a particular reason?”
“Naturally—you need to know why she treats me with such a lack of decorum,” the chief said, winking at me. “Otherwise you might start thinking that any woman older than three hundred can wrap me around her little finger.”
At the House by the Bridge Melifaro dashed out to meet us.
“Juffin,” he said in a mournful whisper. “I don’t understand what’s going on. Melamori has locked herself in my office, and she won’t let me in. I think she’s crying.”
“Well, let her have a good cry,” the boss advised him. “Why shouldn’t a good person cry when times are bad? Everything will be all right, just don’t try to comfort her. She’ll kill you on the spot, and I won’t be able to jump in and set things right. I’ll be too busy. Find Lonli-Lokli. Let him drop whatever he’s doing and wait for us here. And don’t you go anywhere, either. Tell Melamori that in half an hour we’ll be working to beat the band. She can join us if