Brocky it was who took it on himself to keep the conversation moving, against the backdrop of a tortured man’s pleas. He seemed able, in his self-involved way, to screen them out just as the linen mesh in the shutters kept out the worst of the insects. His topic of conversation now was, perforce, himself. Himself and Angelline.
‘I seem to recall you all scoffed,’ he said. ‘All except Marshwic, perhaps.’
‘I scoffed,’ Emily insisted. ‘I scoffed with the best of them.’
‘You all scoffed, then,’ he said. ‘And now, you see, just a little daring, a little bravado, and the lady is quite smitten with me.’
‘“Smitten”?’ Mallen queried.
‘I’d only heard that you got shot in the flab, Brocky. I hadn’t heard she’d been shot in the head,’ added Tubal.
‘Well, if not smitten,’ admitted Brocky, ‘then let us say that the lady and I are getting along famously. It’s amazing what a little common experience can do.’
‘“Common experience”? You’re a fast worker.’ Mallen drained his glass and stood up to collect the empties.
‘We’d have overheard any “common experience”,’ Tubal objected. ‘After all, the lady’s voice is famously loud.’ Then he coloured a little and glanced apologetically towards Emily, who met his look levelly.
‘One might wonder where such a voice comes from,’ Scavian mused. ‘What practice has, as it were, honed it.’
‘The profession of the lady in question?’ agreed Tubal.
Brocky’s leer grew deeper. ‘As it happens, old fellow, the lady has been trained in the most demanding of professions. The shout of command, the sweep of the sword, the athletic step, the keenness of memory and sharpness of eye . . . in short, she’s on the stage!’
Mallen stopped in the doorway at that, and there followed an awkward pause. Acting was hardly considered a prestigious business, but Brocky seemed delighted.
‘Actress, is it?’ the scout asked.
‘Actress, dancer, singer. She was with the Lord Castellan’s Touring, don’t you know. And you know what they say about actresses.’ He went into a spasm of winking and elbow-nudging to give them a clue, if they didn’t.
Emily recalled Marie Angelline at war: quick to command, ready to lead, easy to follow. Acting? Who knew? Perhaps, inside, the girl was as unsure and frightened as the rest.
Brocky opened his mouth to add another innuendo, but a particularly harsh scream of agony broke through to derail him. Scavian stood up and swore under his breath.
‘I wish the poor bastard’d break and get it over with,’ Tubal said. ‘This is the third prisoner we’ve had since I came, and none of the others lasted like this. What the hell are they doing to him?’
‘Just the usual,’ Scavian said. ‘Lascari is . . . persistent, that is all.’ The usual rules of the Club seemed to have lapsed.
‘Have . . . ?’ Emily glanced about, wondering what their reaction would be. ‘Have any of you known any Denlanders from before?’
Brocky shrugged. ‘One or two in the city, on business. Denlanders get the pox like anyone else.’
Tubal gave a weak cough of a laugh. ‘We used to get all our paper through a Denlander merchant. Hammell, that was his name. It was cheaper to buy in bulk from him than in bits and pieces from the local mill. That always struck me as mad, but I wasn’t going to question it.’
‘Only . . . I spoke with one . . . when I went out, last.’ In halting tones she recounted her experience in the indigene village. Towards the end of the account Mallen had come back with full glasses, and he hovered in the doorway, listening mutely.
In the end, Tubal spread his hands. ‘What can we say? It’s a revelation to any soldier, but it’s no less true: they’re people just as we’re people. They believe they’re right, and so do we. You have to think it would be a saner thing if the King and his privy council just kicked the hell out of this new parliament of Denland, and left the rest of us out of it. But there you are.’