almost knocked them off the windowsill. I had to twist and turn like one of the circus acrobats on the Market Square in order to avoid breaking anything.
Gozmo carried on sleeping serenely. That’s what’s it like to have no conscience at all.
I tiptoed up to him, took the rope lying on his bedside table, and then carefully slipped my hand under the pillow. I was right. My fingers came across something cold. My old friend Gozmo wasn’t quite as stupid and placid as you might think.
After borrowing his throwing knife, I made my way across to an armchair, brushed a few cheap rags off it, and sat down. I wanted to make Harold’s entrance effective. The innkeeper had thoroughly deserved it, so it was worth my while thinking how to arrange everything for maximum effect, so that I could get at least some of my own back on the damned traitor.
When I’d visited Gozmo’s room five years earlier (on that occasion I happened to go in through the door), there had been a heavy hunting horn hanging on one of the walls. Quite a valuable item. Now I got up, walked over to the wall, and felt along it until I found the toy trumpet.
I took out my crossbow, sat down in the armchair again, set the weapon on my knees, and imagined Gozmo’s face. I felt like laughing, but I restrained myself.
I wasn’t afraid of waking anyone else. Gozmo didn’t rent out rooms, so there were no guests at the inn, and after their shift the bouncers went home. We were alone in the building, and as for the inhabitants of the houses round about, they had seen far stranger things in their time. Or rather, heard them.
I raised the horn to my lips, filled my lungs with air, and blew.
What a sound that was! Even I hadn’t expected such an effect! The sudden roar—which was like the rumble of a mountain avalanche mingled with the braying of an ass crazed with terror—went hurtling round the room, bouncing off the walls and setting my ears ringing.
Gozmo stopped snoring, flew a full yard up into the air, together with his blanket, and when he landed he started shaking his head violently, still too sleepy to understand a thing. I had got my satisfaction and I roared in merry laughter.
“Who’s there?” the villain barked. His eyes weren’t accustomed to the dark yet and all he could see was the window.
His hand slid under the pillow like a snake and discovered nothing there.
“Harold.”
“Harold?”
“Who else could it be, visiting you at this hour? Light a candle.”
The innkeeper’s hands were trembling and so it took a while for the light to appear, and when it did, it lit up the old swindler more than it did me. He was sitting on the edge of the bed with an absolutely idiotic expression on his face, batting his eyelids crazily. All he could see of me was a shadow in the armchair, a blurred form on the boundary between light and darkness. The light of the candle simply didn’t reach me; the darkness devoured it when it was barely halfway there. I had to lean forward to bring my face into the circle of light.
“Well, have you recovered?” I inquired derisively.
“Harold, you’re a real bastard!”
“I’m glad that you and I are in agreement on that point. Now let’s talk.”
“What about?” Gozmo looked angry and dumbfounded at the same time.
“There’s a little matter I need to discuss. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking—”
“That’ll do you good,” the innkeeper interrupted.
The bowstring twanged, and a bolt went humming across the room and struck the headboard of the bed, very close to Gozmo. He jumped in the air.
“In the name of Darkness! What’s wrong with you? Are you crazy?”
He seemed a little jittery.
“Be so kind as not to interrupt me. I’ve had a hard night and I’ve been feeling a bit on edge. So shut your trap and be so good as to hear me out.”
The innkeeper took my advice and shut up, although his thin lips turned noticeably paler. He couldn’t see the crossbow, but he could sense with every pore in his skin that the weapon was trained on him.
“Right then,” I went on, “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking. About that conversation we had, and about a lot of other apparent coincidences. Why would a rogue like you suddenly decide to apologize? I was a bit too hasty at the time; I decided that it