The Translated Man and Other Stories - Chris Braak [32]
“Do you see a lot of plays?”
“No.”
“Well,” Skinner said, snatching the tickets back. “That explains that then, doesn’t it?”
“Hnf.” Beckett was silent again. Then, “This isn’t going to be like what’s-his-name, right? Elias Warrant?”
“When have you seen Warrant’s plays?”
“Didn’t. Had to read them in school.” He made a disgusted face that Skinner couldn’t see, but presumably could hear in his voice.
“You didn’t like him.” This was not a question.
“Rattling on and on about the nobility of wealth and all that? About how the best thing in the world you could be was a merchant? Selling lard to the natives and making off with their phlogiston or gold or what?” Beckett grunted. “Couldn’t stand him.”
“You probably liked the plays with all the murders and ghosts and things.” The bird had vanished from Skinner’s shoulder, but Beckett could now see centipedes moving around in the shadows.
“Didn’t get to read much of them,” Beckett replied. “Didn’t you go to public school?”
“Not once I’d manifested as a Knocker.” Skinner tapped the silver plate over her eyes. “They send us to special schools.”
“Oh. Lucky you.”
Silence again.
“When did you manifest?” Beckett asked.
“I was thirteen. Just come from seeing…Capale. That’s another Canthi Pantomime. I used to love those when I was a girl. I read them all. I’d seen all sixteen of the canonical pantomimes, and a couple of the newer ones by the time…” She smiled ruefully. “Well, let’s just say I’d have paid better attention to Capale if I’d known it was going to be the last thing I ever saw.”
“Hm.” Beckett struggled with his words, trying to find something both sympathetic and supportive to say. He settled on changing the subject. “At school, everything they had us read was a moral lesson. Always something about the Word, and how we could apply it to our lives.”
Skinner said nothing, then leaned forward. “Elijah,” she whispered, her voice amused and scandalous. “You sound like a man that doesn’t believe.”
“Heh.”
“How does that happen? How does a non-believer end up hunting down people for committing heresy?”
The old coroner shrugged. The centipedes had started crawling down the back of his coat, but he ignored them. It was easier to ignore things that he was sure were hallucinations. “There’s steady work in it, for one.” He paused thoughtfully. “The Heretical Sciences are dangerous, Skinner. Really dangerous. They never work the way people want them to, and someone ends up dying. That’s why the church made them illegal.”
“So, you hunt down heretics out of what . . . civic responsibility? Concern for your fellow man?” He was a liar, and Skinner knew it. It was a delicate process, teasing Beckett’s motivations out of the iron trap he kept them locked in. He deflected questions away from himself by old habit, and had probably spent little time considering the why of his life.
The tone of his voice shifted, slightly, to the gruff-but-jocular tone he used as a shield, and Skinner realized that she’d lost this round. “You could say that. Really, it’s just for the money.” He shifted around in his seat and tried to squish the centipede between his shoulder blades. “Where did you get these tickets, by the way?”
“Stitch. He gave them to me when he sent me to find you.”
“Did he, now?”
“What?”
“Nothing.” Beckett pursed his lips. “It’s just . . . well. It’s just interesting.”
Beckett was silent then, and Skinner considered the sound of his voice. It wasn’t just cold, or gruff. There was a ragged pain to the sound of him, and there had been for the months that Skinner had known him. That had come as a surprise. Beckett didn’t know it, but Skinner had specifically requested the opportunity to work with him, once she’d been inducted into the coroners. The sour, wounded, sick old man was a legend in certain circles. Old Adelwulf Vie-Gorgon, who’d led the department before Mr. Stitch took over, had only ever spoken of Beckett with the utmost respect. Elijah Beckett was a man who had sacrificed everything